The Oxford Handbook of Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible 9780190462673, 9780190077501, 0190462671

Table of contents :
Cover
Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible
Copyright
Dedication
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
List of Contributors
Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction
The Historical Journey of Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies
Current Challenges to Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies
Central Issues for Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies
Globalization
Neoliberalism
(Digital) Media Cultures
Intersectionality
Why Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies Matters in a World Threatened by Ecological Devastation, Technofascist Domination, Hegemonic Economic Exploitation of Billions of People, and the Rise of Ethno-Religious Nationalist Fundamentalism
Part I: The Impact Of Globalization On Feminist Biblical Studies
Chapter 1: Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization
The Story of Feminist Biblical Studies (Part 1): Feminist Studies in Religion
The Story of Feminist Biblical Studies (Part 2): Feminist Biblical Studies
Feminist Analysis of Power (Part 1): Categories of Analysis
Feminist Analysis of Power (Part 2): Intersectionality
Quilting Democratics
Toward Critical Political Biblical Studies (Part 1): Speaking with an Emancipatory Accent
Toward Critical Political Biblical Studies (Part 2): Combating Neoliberalism to Recover a Religious Language of Hope
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 2: The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
“ESC”: Rights in Three Tiers
Problems in the Human Rights Model
Western Biases in Human Rights Discourse
Human Rights: Religious or Humanist?
The Problem of Women’s Rights in Human Rights Discourse: A Feminist Assessment
Religious Devaluation
Philosophical Devaluation
The Bible on Women’s Human Rights: Yes, No, or Maybe?
The Nature of the Text
Reflexive Interpretation
Rights Talk in the Bible
Evaluating the Bible by UN Standards of Female Human Rights Abuses Related to Religion: The WUNRN Study (2002)
Rejects and Prospects: What Endures?
Bibliography
Chapter 3: Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations as Global Missionary Tools?
Are Bible Translations Contemporary or Moribund? Perusing the Literary Landscape
Why the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Favors Another Bible Translation
Whose Bible Is the New Revised Translation Anyway? Negotiating the Translation Principles
Laying Bare the Discrepancy between the Catholic Church’s Global Missionary Goals and Its New Edition of the Bible to Be Studied and Proclaimed
Moving the Catholic Bible Translation into the Global Twenty-First Century: Concluding Comments
Bibliography
Chapter 4: The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts
The Problem of Colonial Bible Translations in Africa
The Development of Missionary Bible Translations for the Shona Peoples
The Identification of the Shona God with the Biblical God
The Gendering of the Shona God in the Colonial Translations
Toward Postcolonial-Feminist Bible Translations in Africa: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 5: Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective
Queering and Queerying as Liminal Exegetical Practice
Queer(y)ing Liminality: The (De) Construction of Sex and Gender
Unravelling Identity
Challenging (Contemporary) Heteronormativity
Indecent Queering
Queer as Outwitting
Queer(y)ing Reception
Conclusion
Chapter 6: Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming African Societies
Explaining Sexual Scripting and Its Usefulness for Biblical Interpretation
Scripts of Vile Masculinities
Scripts of Violent Masculinities
Scripts of Inviolable Masculinity
Re-scripting by Re-inscribing the “Queer Sex”
Re-writing the Script: About the Future Task of Feminist Biblical Interpreters
Bibliography
Chapter 7: The Demand to Listento Korean “Comfort Women” and to Two Biblical Women
Listening to Korean Comfort Women
Emphasizing the Centrality of the Two Women
Recognizing the Women’s Close Relationship
Discovering the Ambiguity of Pronouns
Investigating the Topsy-Turvy Trial
Uncovering the Failure of the “Listening Heart”
Women under Blades and Blazes: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 8: Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization
The Debate over Economic Neoliberalism in Biblical Scholarship
Reading the Bible from Below in the Globalized Era
First Insight: Global Asynchrony
Second Insight: Biblical Texts Unveil Reality Even Today
Third Insight: Women Are Always the First Victims within Structures of Domination
The Ongoing Challenges of Reading from Below: Concluding Comments
Bibliography
Chapter 9: Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs
Toward the Development of an African Feminist Ethics
Listening to Woman Wisdom in Proverbs 1–9
The Communitarian Outlook of Woman Wisdom as a Foundation for an Endogenous African Ethics
The Strange Woman as a Reflection of the Western Foreign Ethics in Africa
Communitarian Values, Care, and Empathy in African Feminist Ethical Deliberations: Toward a Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 10: Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence
Embodied Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics
Lament as a Response to Violent Patriarchal Misogyny
Various Voices of Lament: Psalms, Lamentations, Beyoncé
Psalm 22
Lamentations 1
Beyoncé and “Hold Up” from Lemonade
Lament: An Option to Quiete Fear, Enhance Love, Effect Healing
Bibliography
Part II: The Impact Of Neoliberalism On Feminist Biblical Interpretation
Chapter 11: Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies
Disconnected from Women’s Studies: The Neoliberal Turn in Feminist Biblical Studies
Phyllis Trible’s Depatriarchalizing Strategy
Carol Meyers’s Historicizing Strategy
Ilana Pardes’s Textualizing Strategy
Susan Ackerman’s Mythologizing Strategy
Tikva Frymer-Kensky’s Idealizing Strategy
Moving Beyond Neoliberal Feminist Biblical Scholarship: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 12: Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age
Neoliberalism as Governing Rationality
Neoliberalism and Higher Education: The Position of Wendy Brown
Considering Neoliberal Economic Justifications for Biblical Studies in the Undergraduate Curriculum
Economic Justification No. 1: Cost-Efficiency
Economic Justification No. 2: Market Opportunity
Economic Justification No. 3: Employment Skills
Economic Justification No. 4: Human Capital Appreciation
Economic Justification No. 5: Revenue Generation
Intersectional (Feminist) Biblical Studies and Neoliberalism
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 13: European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era
What is Neoliberalism?
What is the Neoliberal University?
Feminist Biblical Scholarship and Neoliberalism in Exegetical Scholarship
On the Future of European Feminist Biblical Studies in the Neoliberal Era
Bibliography
Chapter 14: Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings
Neoliberalism and Neoliberal Capitalism
About Neoliberal Contributions to Theologies of Suffering, Submission, and Redemption
About Suffering, Submission, and Redemption in Prophetic Texts
About Suffering, Submission, and Redemption in Judges 7 and Job
Uncovering the Connections between Economics and Biblical Theologies of Suffering: Concluding Comments
Bibliography
Chapter 15: Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism
Postcolonial Criticism
Feminist Biblical Postcolonial Criticism
Three Readings
Miriam
Rahab
Achsah
Final Ponderings
Bibliography
Chapter 16: On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics of Migration
The Topic of Migration in Feminist Biblical Studies
Toward a Sociological Framework for a Feminist Migration Hermeneutics
Methodological Considerations for a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics on Migration
Studying the Bible as a Literary Tapestry of Gendered Migration Stories: Concluding Remarks
Bibliography
Part III: The Impact Of (Digital) Media Cultures On Feminist Biblical Exegesis
Chapter 17: The Bible, Women, and Video Games
The Bible and Bioshock: The Game Story
Gender, Women, and Bioshock
On the Relationship of Avatars and Gender
On the Visualization of Female Characters and the Beauty Ideal
On the Female Characters in the Game World
On the Substance, EVE, and the Biblical Eve
Bible, Gender, and Gaming: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 18: Gaming with Rahab and the Spies
The Prisoner’s Dilemma Game
Payoff matrix
Nash equilibrium
Dominant Strategy
Focal Point
Reading Rahab’s Story as a Prisoner’s Dilemma
Payoff matrix
Nash equilibrium
Dominant Strategy
Focal Point
Rahab and the Spies as Gamers: What Do We Gain?
Toward a Reading of the Bible as a Game: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 19: Ecofeminist Biblical Hermeneutics for Cyborgs and the Story of Jezebel
Jezebel the Cyborg
Reading the Bible as Cyborgs
A Cyborg Reading of Jezebel’s Story (I Kgs. 16:29–2 Kgs. 19:37)
Naturecultures
Binaries
Liminal Figures
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 20: Sexuality, Stoning, and Supersessionism in Biblical Epic Films of the Post–World War II Era
The Pericope Adulterae in John 8:1–11
The Pericope Adulterae and the Bible Epic film
David and Bathsheba (1951, DIR. Henry King)
Solomon and Sheba (1959, DIR. King Vidor)
The Story of Ruth (1960; DIR.Henry Koster)
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 21: Noah Narratives, Gender Issues, and the Hollywood Hermeneutic
Noah Narratives and the Popular Cinema
Noah’s Ark (U.S., DIR. Michael Curtiz, 1928)
The Green Pastures (U.S., dir. Marc Connelly/William Keighley, 1936)
When Worlds Collide (U.S., dir. Rudolph Maté, 1951)
The Bible: In the Beginning . . . (U.S./IT, dir. John Huston, 1966)
Noah’s Ark (DE/U.S., dir. John Irvin, 1999)
Northfork (U.S., dir. Michael Polish, 2003)
Evan ALMIGHTY (U.S., dir. Tom Shadyac, 2007)
Noah (U.S., dir. Darren Aronofsky, 2014)
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 22: Mediating Dinah’s Story in Film
La Genèse—She Asked for It, or Dinah Goes to Africa
The Red Tent—All Women Want It, or Dinah Visits the Lifetime Network
Rape or Romance? Interpretive Trajectories of Genesis 34
Conclusion
Chapter 23: Exploring Biblical Women in Music
Sarah’s Love for Abraham
Issues of Motherhood and Infertility in the Sarah-Hagar Relationship
Sarah’s Relationship with Isaac
Hagar’s Relationships with Abraham and Ishmael
A Pious and Obedient Rebecca at the Well
Jochebed and Pharaoh’s Daughter as Mothers
Miriam as a Strong Leader
Michal as a Woman in Love
Bathsheba Re-imagined
Hearing Their Stories in Music: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 24: Hagar in Nineteenth-Century Southern Women’s Novels
Some General Features of “Domestic” Novels on Hagar
Element 1: The Orphaned or Abandoned Heroine Lacking Maternal Support
Element 2: A Vulnerable Heroine Endangered by Unscrupulous or Dangerous Adversaries
Element 3: A Heroine Finding Purpose or Redemption in Domesticated Existence
Element 4: Racial Ambiguity Explaining Her Unconventional Behavior
Hagar’s Blackness and White Women Writers: Concluding Comments
Bibliography
Chapter 25: Bathsheba in Contemporary Romance Novels
The Depiction of Bathsheba as Seductress and Victim
Love and Romance
Imagining Bathsheba with Power and Agency
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 26: Teaching the Bible and Popular Media as Part of Contemporary Rape Culture
The Impact of Popular Culture on Gender
The Cultural Assumption about Forced Consent
The Cultural Assumption of Victim Blaming
The Cultural Assumption of Men as Hard-Wired Sexual Violators
The Cultural Assumption of Male Sexual Entitlement
Towards a Rape-Freeing Pedagogy in the Academic Teaching of the Bible: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Part IV: The Emergence Of Intersectional Feminist Readings
Chapter 27: Gender and the Heterarchy Alternative for Re-Modeling Ancient Israel
The Origins of the Patriarchy Model in Ancient-Israel Research
The Patriarchy Model in Twentieth and Twenty-First-Century Research on Ancient Israel
Challenges to the Patriarchy Paradigm in Classical Studies
Challenges to the Patriarchy Paradigm in Studies of Israelite Women: The Household and the Wider Community
Feminist Critiques: Challenges to the Patriarchy Paradigm
Conclusion: Another Model
Bibliography
Chapter 28: Retrieving the History of Women Biblical Interpreters
The History of Biblical Interpretation: Women Interpreters as Subjects of Study
Women Interpreters through the Centuries
Female Biblical Interpreters in Late Antiquity (150 ce to 500 ce)
Women Reading the Bible in the Middle Ages (600 ce to 1500ce)
Women Biblical Interpreters in the Early Modern Era (1500ce to 1780ce)
Women Interpreters in the “Long Nineteenth Century” (1780–1918)
Globalization in the Study of Women Interpreters
Jewish Women Interpreters in Eastern Europe
Wallata Petros, Ethiopian Archdeaconess
Ursula de Jesús, Afro-Peruvian Mystic
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Mexican Nun
Pandita Ramabai, Indian Translator
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 29: A Queer Critique of Looking for “Male” and “Female” Voices in the Hebrew Bible
The Power and Promise of Brenner’s and Dijk-Hemmes’s Proposal
On Gendering Texts, on the Scholar’s Bookshelf
Two (and Only Two) Genders?
“Un-gendering” Texts: Toward a Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 30: Queering Delilah with Critical Theory and Gendered Bible Hermeneutics
Gender Trouble and Sex Talk in Judges 16
Queering Dinah in Judges 16
Closing Thoughts
Bibliography
Chapter 31: Examining Scripture in Light of Trans Women’s Voices
Who Is a “Real” Woman, Anyway?
The Androgyne in the Book of Genesis
Trans Women Speak on Gen. 1:27
The Androgyne in the New Testament
Trans Women Speak on Gal. 3:28
Thoughts on a Transgender Hermeneutic
Bibliography
Chapter 32: The Purpose, Principles, and Goals of Egalitarian Biblical Interpretation
A Description of the Egalitarian History, Contexts, and Goals in Comparison to Complementarians and Other Feminists
A Discussion of Five Egalitarian Hermeneutical Principles
The Egalitarian Influence in Evangelical Churches
From Egalitarian Readings of the Bible to Church Practice: Concluding Observations
Bibliography
Chapter 33: Animal Studies, Feminism, and Biblical Interpretation
Animal Studies and Feminist Studies
Re-Reading the Biblical Texts
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 34: A Multidimensional Approach in Feminist Ecological Biblical Studies
Feminism, Ecological Feminism, and Biblical Studies
Violence against Earth as the Primary Prompt in Ecological Feminist Hermeneutics
Matter and Creation
Humankind and the Imago Dei
Earth’s Agency
Perspectives for Reading with Earth: Earth and Humans in Partnership
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 35: Hagar and Sarah in Art and Interfaith Dialog
Textual Traditions
Artistic Traditions
Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 36: Norwegian Muslim and Christian Feminists Reading the Hagar Narratives
“Analogical Reasoning”: A Hermeneutical Strategy of Identifying with the Story’s Reality
“Performative Relation”: A Hermeneutical Strategy of Embodying the Story
“Moral Enrichment” and “Ethical Critique”: A Hermeneutical Strategy of Evaluating the Story
“Testimony”: A Hermeneutical Strategy of Generating Confessions
Dialogical Readings as Producers of Hermeneutical Strategies: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 37: Intertextual Femininity in Proverbs and the Dao De Jing
A Strong Mother? The Mother in the Dao De Jing and the Strong Woman of Proverbs 31
The Dao of Woman Wisdom? Proverbs 1–9 and Yin-Yang in the Dao De Jing
Deconstructing Femininity in the Dao De Jing and Proverbs: A Conclusion
Bibliography
Index of Scholarly Authors
Index of Biblical References
Index of Other Texts, Non-Scholarly Authors, and Media Sources

Citation preview

T h e Ox f o r d H a n d b o o k o f

F E M I N IST A PPROAC H E S TO T H E H E BR E W BI BL E

The Oxford Handbook of

FEMINIST APPROACHES TO THE HEBREW BIBLE Edited by

SUSANNE SCHOLZ

1

1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2021 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Scholz, Susanne, 1963- editor. Title: The Oxford handbook of feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible / edited by Susanne Scholz. Description: New York : Oxford University Press, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2020022656 (print) | LCCN 2020022657 (ebook) | ISBN 9780190462673 (hardback) | ISBN 9780190077501 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Old Testament—Feminist criticism. Classification: LCC BS1181.8 .O99 2021 (print) | LCC BS1181.8 (ebook) | DDC 221.6082—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020022656 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020022657 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America

In Memory of Judith E. McKinlay (1938–2019), feminist scholar, colleague, mentor, and teacher to many and whose last piece of writing appears in this book.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgmentsxi List of Contributorsxv Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introductionxxiii Susanne Scholz

PA RT I   T H E I M PAC T OF G L OBA L I Z AT ION ON F E M I N I ST B I B L IC A L S T U DI E S 1. Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza 2. The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective Carole R. Fontaine 3. Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations as Global Missionary Tools? Carol J. Dempsey, OP

3 21

37

4. The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts Dora R. Mbuwayesango

53

5. Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective Jeremy Punt

65

6. Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming African Societies Sarojini Nadar

81

7. The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women” and to Two Biblical Women Yani Yoo 8. Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization Rainer Kessler

97 113

viii   table of contents

9. Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde

129

10. Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan

141

PA RT I I   T H E I M PAC T OF N E OL I B E R A L I SM ON F E M I N I ST B I B L IC A L I N T E R P R E TAT ION 11. Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies Esther Fuchs

159

12. Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age John W. Fadden

181

13. European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era Hanna Stenström

199

14. Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings Teresa J. Hornsby

213

15. Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism Judith E. McKinlay

231

16. On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics of Migration Susanne Scholz

247

PA RT I I I   T H E I M PAC T OF ( DIG I TA L ) M E DIA C U LT U R E S ON F E M I N I S T B I B L IC A L E X E G E SI S 17. The Bible, Women, and Video Games Linda S. Schearing

265

18. Gaming with Rahab and the Spies Charles M. Rix

281

19. Ecofeminist Biblical Hermeneutics for Cyborgs and the Story of Jezebel Arthur W. Walker-Jones

297

table of contents   ix

20. Sexuality, Stoning, and Supersessionism in Biblical Epic Films of the Post–World War II Era Adele Reinhartz

313

21. Noah Narratives, Gender Issues, and the Hollywood Hermeneutic Anton Karl Kozlovic

327

22. Mediating Dinah’s Story in Film Rhonda Burnette-Bletsch

353

23. Exploring Biblical Women in Music Helen Leneman

371

24. Hagar in Nineteenth-Century Southern Women’s Novels Vanessa L. Lovelace

389

25. Bathsheba in Contemporary Romance Novels Sara M. Koenig

407

26. Teaching the Bible and Popular Media as Part of Contemporary Rape Culture Beatrice J. W. Lawrence

425

PA RT I V   T H E E M E RG E N C E OF I N T E R SE C T IONA L F E M I N I S T R E A DI N G S 27. Gender and the Heterarchy Alternative for Re-Modeling Ancient Israel Carol Meyers 28. Retrieving the History of Women Biblical Interpreters Joy A. Schroeder 29. A Queer Critique of Looking for “Male” and “Female” Voices in the Hebrew Bible Caryn Tamber-Rosenau

443 461

479

30. Queering Delilah with Critical Theory and Gendered Bible Hermeneutics495 Caroline Blyth 31. Examining Scripture in Light of Trans Women’s Voices Katy E. Valentine

509

x   table of contents

32. The Purpose, Principles, and Goals of Egalitarian Biblical Interpretation Karen Strand Winslow 33. Animal Studies, Feminism, and Biblical Interpretation Ken Stone 34. A Multidimensional Approach in Feminist Ecological Biblical Studies Anne Elvey 35. Hagar and Sarah in Art and Interfaith Dialog Aaron Rosen 36. Norwegian Muslim and Christian Feminists Reading the Hagar Narratives Anne Hege Grung

525 543

555 575

591

37. Intertextual Femininity in Proverbs and the Dao De Jing David A. Schones

605

Index of Scholarly Authors Index of Biblical References Index of Other Texts, Non-Scholarly Authors, and Media Sources

619 633 641

Acknowledgments

Some books take a long time and a lot of support from a lot of people to make it to the  finish line. This is one of those books. Without my acquisition editor at Oxford University Press, Steve Wiggins, I am not sure I would have taken on this particular project. I am most grateful for his encouraging and nurturing approach to my various ideas about publishing a scholarly anthology on feminist biblical studies. His steady responses and affirming email messages made it possible for me to design and edit this Handbook on feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible. Without his welcoming, reliable, and open-minded support, it would have been much harder for this anthology to see the light of day. Thank you, Steve! You are making biblical studies a better field. I also thank my contributors who worked hard and long on researching and writing their essays. We went through thick and thin with many of the essays, and I am grateful that you allowed me to be part of your writing process. It is an honor to see colleagues at work and to converse with each other on improving, changing, and expanding this or that aspect of the various essays. Thank you for being consistent and prompt in your responses. Thank you for your cooperation when reviews came back with additional modifications. I also thank especially the early contributors for their patience while I was herding delayed contributors like cats! It is definitely a time-consuming challenge to get thirty-seven essays published in a single volume. Finally, it is finished. Many thanks also to the anonymous reviewer who evaluated many included and excluded essays. You know who you are! Without the anonymous reviewer’s willingness to assess many essays, my editorial job would have been far more difficult. Thank you, dear anonymous reviewer, for your invaluable assistance. I am also certain that the various contributors appreciated getting expert advice on how to revise their essays in the best possible ways. I also thank my former doctoral student, David A. Schones, who worked as my research assistant in 2017–18 and provided valuable library and proofreading support during that time. Since my editorial work took place over a four-year period, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my employing institution, Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. A research leave in spring 2015 and a two-two course load per semester ensured that I enjoyed sufficient intellectual and mental space to work on this Handbook. It also included researching and writing my own essay, as well as editing everybody else’s essays. I also would like to express my gratitude to the SMU Office of Research and Graduate Studies for awarding me a URC travel grant to present research related to my essay, included in this volume, at the annual meeting of the European Society for Intercultural Theology and Interreligious Studies (ESITIS) in Münster, Germany, in

xii   acknowledgments April 2017. Gathering and conversing with an international and interdisciplinary group of scholars interested in “Religion and Politics in the Crisis of Engagement: Towards the Relevance of Intercultural Theologies and Interreligious Studies” for three days enabled me to share my initial ideas for my essay on a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration. During the conference I also met another ESITIS member who is a scholar in Interreligious Studies and contributor to the Handbook, Anne Hege Grung, who in 2017 became the president of ESITIS. Conference attendance is a unique, important, and nurturing gift to the working and networking scholar indeed! I also thank my many feminist colleagues at the Society of Biblical Literature who have inspired and supported me in my work as a feminist Hebrew Bible scholar and teacher for the last two decades. Without their scholarship and collegiality, the life of this feminist exegete would not be the same. Among them are Phyllis Trible, J. Cheryl Exum, Athalya Brenner, Caroline Vander Stichele, Shelly Matthews, Julia O’Brien, Alice Keefe, Bernadette Brooten, Sheila Briggs, Mercedes García Bachmann, Claudia Camp, April Deconick, Cheryl Anderson, Yeong-Mee Lee, Naomi Graetz, Christl M. Maier, Janette Ok, Angela Harkins, Dominka Kurek-Chomycz, Marianne Bjelland Kartzow, Shively Smith, Mignon Jacobs, Heidi Marc-Wolf, Nancy Tan, Monica J. Melanchthon, Marie-Theres Wacker, Gay  L.  Byron, Gerlinde Baumann, Dorothea Erbele-Küster, Kristin De Troyer, Irmtraud Fischer, Susan Haddox, Renate Jost, Rebecca Raphael, Wilda C. M. Gafney, Rhiannon Graybill, Gwynn Kessler, Melanie Johnson-DeBaufre, Silvia Schroer, Jacqueline Lapsley, Carolyn Sharp, Margaret Aymer, Yael Shemesh, Nancy Rahn, Davina C. Lopez, Angela Standhartinger, F. Rachel Magdalene, Rannfrid Thelle, Jan Quesada, and Deborah Rooke. I treasure your collegial spirit. Thank you. I also am grateful to my community of Perkins and SMU colleagues who encourage my daily work. Among them are Beth Newman, Jeanne Stevenson-Moessner, Pat Davis, Sze-Kar Wan, Robert Hunt, Billy Abraham, Ted Campbell, Karen Baker-Fletcher, Garth Fletcher, Ulrike Schultze, Dennis Foster, Linda Eads, Susanne Johnson, Ruben Habito, Bonnie Wheeler, Crista DeLuzio, Lolita Inniss Buckner, and Joanna Grossman. I also thank my Dean, Craig Hill, for his collegial and administrative support. I thank my Iyengar yoga friends in Dallas, especially my yoga teachers, Marj Rash and George Purvis, whose regular yoga classes guarantee that my yoga practice continues despite editorial deadlines and nightshifts. How I could research, write, or edit without my regular asana and pranayama practice, I really do not know. I also thank Lorraine Keating and Wisky-Carlos Scholz for their companionship keeping me centered, sane, and happy. The final word of posthumous gratitude goes to our colleague, Judith McKinlay, who contributed her last piece of scholarly writing to this volume. She emailed me on November 2, 2018, asking me about the progress of this volume and telling me of her grave illness. I responded that the Handbook was not yet completed and thanked her for her scholarly contributions to the feminist study of the Bible. On February 9, 2019, Sarah Mitchell emailed stating:

acknowledgments   xiii It is with much sadness I write to you, as scholar-colleagues of Judith, to let you know of her death yesterday. Although I have not met all of you, I walked alongside Judith in her developing academic career and feel I know you all. Your encouragement and admiration of Judith’s biblical and postcolonial research and writing has brought much joy to me—as it did, of course, to her too. Sadly, her work was not as appreciated nor understood very much in Aotearoa-New Zealand and her international experiences offered her the opportunities she needed to explore fully the academic biblical critical world. I do not have to tell you what a creative writer and thinker she was . . . or what a delightful person she was. For me, she was my closest friend . . . more a sister than anything else. Her experiences with all of you were highly significant for her and I know she will have expressed her gratitude to you all. I thank you for your involvement in her life.

This Handbook on feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible is dedicated to Judith as a token of our deepest appreciation for her scholarly contributions to the field of biblical studies. Book projects, especially comprehensive ones like this one, take years to complete. In the meantime life and death happen. I am grateful and proud to offer this volume to the scholarly community interested in the feminist study of the Hebrew Bible. May our scholarly efforts and insights contribute to the healing of this world. Susanne Scholz Dallas, Texas, U.S.A. May 31, 2019

List of Contributors

Caroline Blyth, Ph.D., is a senior lecturer in religion at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. Her research interests focus on gender and sexuality in the Bible and popular culture, with a particular focus on representations of gender violence in biblical and contemporary texts. Her books are The Narrative of Rape in Genesis 34: Interpreting Dinah’s Silence (Oxford University Press, 2010); and Reimagining Delilah’s Afterlife as a Femme Fatale: The Lost Seduction (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017). Rhonda Burnette-Bletsch, Ph.D., is Professor of Biblical Studies and Theology Department Chair at Eastern University in St. Davids, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Her research interests include reception studies, religion and film, and representations of women, race, and class in both biblical texts and their reception. Among her publications is the two-volume The Bible in Motion: A Handbook on the Bible and its Reception in Film (Walter de Gruyter, 2016); and she serves as a general editor of the SBL monograph series The Bible and its Reception. Carol J. Dempsey, OP, Ph.D., is Professor of Theology (Biblical Studies) at the University of Portland in Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. Her areas of expertise and interests are Hebrew Bible/Old Testament prophets, biblical Hebrew poetry, biblical Catholic ethics, and the Bible and ecology. Select recent publications and works in progress include The Bible and Literature (co-author, Orbis Books, 2015); The Paulist Press Commentary (co-editor and author of “Introduction to the Prophets,” “Isaiah,” “Habakkuk”; Paulist Press, 2018); Isaiah (Wisdom Commentary Series; Liturgical Press; in progress); Beyond Christian Anthropocentrism: What It Means to Be Catholic in the New Diaspora (Dispatches from the New Diaspora Series; Lexington/Fortress Press; in progress). Anne Elvey, Ph.D., is an Honorary Research Associate at Trinity College Theological School, a member at the Network for Research in Religion and Social Policy at the University of Divinity, and an Adjunct Research Fellow at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. Her research interests are in ecopoetics, ecological hermeneutics, ecological feminism, new materialism, poetry, Gospel of Luke, and the Magnificat. Her recent books include Ecological Aspects of War: Engagements with Biblical Texts (co-editor; Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017); and White on White (Cordite Books, 2018). John W. Fadden, Ph.D., is an Adjunct Instructor at St. John Fisher College in Rochester, New York, U.S.A. His research interests include the use and abuse of the Bible, the Bible and popular culture, and teaching undergraduate biblical studies.

xvi   list of contributors Carole R. Fontaine, Ph.D., is Distinguished Taylor Professor of Biblical Theology and History, Emerita. Her research has been primarily in the area of feminist theological approaches to biblical wisdom literature and its cognates, as well as human rights, iconography, women’s history, and archaeology. She is the author of With Eyes of Flesh: The Bible, Gender and Human Rights (Brill, 2008); Smooth Words: Women, Proverbs and Performance in the Hebrew Bible (Bloomsbury, 2009); and is the co-editor of A Feminist Companion to Reading the Bible: Methods, Approaches, Strategies (Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), and other volumes of The Feminist Companion to the Bible, with Athalya Brenner, and more than one hundred articles. A human rights activist, she currently resides in the Berkshires, where she serves as the WUNRN Research Associate, blogging for a women’s NGO (www.wunrn.com; carolefontainephd.com) reporting to UNWOMEN. Esther Fuchs, Ph.D., is Professor Emerita of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies at the University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, U.S.A. In addition to biblical studies, she is interested in the intersections of gender and feminism with Hebrew studies, Israel studies, and Holocaust studies. She has published numerous books and over eighty essays in academic journals and anthologies, and over one hundred book reviews in Jewish and women’s studies. In biblical studies her writing has focused on textual biblical politics, and feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible. She is the co-editor of On the Cutting Edge: The Study of Women in Biblical Worlds (Continuum, 2004); and is the author of Sexual Politics in the Biblical Narrative: Reading the Hebrew Bible as  a Woman (Sheffield Academic Press, 2000); and Feminist Theory and the Bible (Lexington, 2016). Anne Hege Grung, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Interreligious Studies at the Faculty of Theology at the University of Oslo in Norway. Her research area is in empirical and theoretical studies of interreligious relations, particularly Muslim-Christian relations, with a feminist perspective. Her works include studies on Muslim-Christian co-readings of canonical texts and on questions of authority, leadership, and women’s human rights connected to religious pluralism and interreligious encounters. She is the author of Gender Justice in Muslim-Christian Readings (Brill, 2015); Christian and Muslim Women in Norway Making Meaning of Texts from the Bible, the Koran and the Hadith (Brill, 2016); and she is the co-editor of Bodies, Borders, Believers: Ancient Texts and Present Conversations (James Clark, 2016). Teresa  J.  Hornsby, Ph.D., is Professor of Religious Studies, Drury University in Springfield, Missouri, U.S.A., and Affiliated Professor of Religious Studies at Chicago Theological Seminary in Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. Her research is in gender theory and biblical criticism. Among her publications are Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship (co-edited with Ken Stone; SBL Press, 2011); and Transgender, Intersex, and Biblical Interpretation (co-authored with Deryn  P.  Guest; SBL Press, 2016).

list of contributors   xvii Rainer Kessler, Dr. theol., is Professor Emeritus of Old Testament, University of Marburg in Germany. His research interests include social history, biblical prophecy, and ethics. Among his publications are Micha (second ed.; Herder, 2000), The Social History of Ancient Israel: An Introduction (trans. by Linda M. Maloney; Fortress Press, 2008); Maleachi (Herder, 2011); Der Weg zum Leben: Ethik des Alten Testaments (Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2017). Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan, Ph.D., is Professor of Religion at Shaw University Divinity School in Raleigh, North Carolina, U.S.A. Her areas of expertise and interests include theology; justice; womanist and feminist studies; the Bible and culture; violence and religion; grief and trauma; music; ethics; humor; faith, spirituality, and health; women’s religious and leadership experience; pedagogy; rage, grief, and transformation; gender theory; sexuality; and popular media as praxeology for constructive and narrative theology. Among her recent publications and works in progress are Baptized Rage, Transformed Grief: I Got Through So Can You (Wipf and Stock, 2017); Hosea (co-author with Valerie Bridgeman; Wisdom Commentary Series; Liturgical Press, in progress); Embodied Ecstasy: A Womanist Systematic Theology of Relationality (in progress). Sara M. Koenig, Ph.D., is Professor of Biblical Studies at Seattle Pacific University in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A.  Her research focuses on biblical hermeneutics, literary readings, and the field of reception history. She published Isn’t This Bathsheba? A Study in Characterization (Wipf and Stock, 2011); and Bathsheba Survives (University of South Carolina Press, 2018). Anton Karl Kozlovic, Ph.D., researches in the Department of Screen and Media at Flinders University in Australia, and the Department of Media and Communication at Deakin University in Australia. He has published extensively in the areas of religion and film, Cecil B. DeMille studies, and interreligious dialog. His chapters and multiple entries occur within Sex, Religion, Media (Rowman and Littlefield, 2002); Cyber Worship in Multifaith Perspectives (Scarecrow Press, 2006); Encyclopedia of Religion and Film (ABC-Clio, 2011); Bible and Cinema: Fifty Key Films (Routledge, 2013); The Bible in Motion: A Handbook of the Bible and its Reception in Film (Walter de Gruyter, 2016). Beatrice J. W. Lawrence, Ph.D., is Associate Professor at Seattle University in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. Her research interests include biblical interpretation, rape culture in the Bible, religious studies, rabbinic texts and hermeneutics, and theologies of suffering. Her book is Jethro and the Jews: Jewish Biblical Interpretation and the Question of Identity (Brill, 2017); and she is co-editor of Rape Culture and Religious Studies: Critical and Pedagogical Engagements (Lexington, 2019). Helen Leneman, Ph.D., in an independent scholar. Her research investigates biblical narratives in music, especially in operas and oratorios, with a focus on biblical women. Among her publications are The Performed Bible: The Story of Ruth in Opera and Oratorio (Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007); Love, Lust and Lunacy: The Stories of Saul and

xviii   list of contributors David in Music (Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2010); Moses: The Man and the Myth in Music (Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2014); The Bible Retold by Jewish Artists, Writers, Composers & Filmmakers (co-edited with Barry Dov Walfish; Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2015); and Musical Illuminations of Genesis Tales (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017). Vanessa  L.  Lovelace, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Hebrew Bible at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A.  Her research interests include sociological approaches to the study of women in the Deuteronomistic History, particularly feminist theory of gender and nation. Among her recent publications are Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse (co-editor; SBL Press, 2016); and “The Deuteronomistic History: Intersections of Ethnicity, Gender, Sexuality and Nation” (Fortress Press, 2018). She is currently working on a reading of Hebrew Bible narratives as a womanist politics of belonging. Dora R. Mbuwayesango, Ph.D., is George E. and Iris Battle Professor of Hebrew Bible and Dean of Students at Hood Theological Seminary in Salisbury, North Carolina, U.S.A.  Her research interests include postcolonial interpretation, colonial Bible translations, and sexuality in the Hebrew Bible. She is the co-editor of Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Hermeneutics (SBL Press, 2012). Among her articles are “The Bible as Tool of Colonization: the Zimbabwean Context” (Lexington Books, 2018); and “Numbers” (Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2019). Judith E. McKinlay, Ph.D., was Lecturer in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. Among her publications are Gendering Wisdom the Host: Biblical Invitations to Eat and Drink (Sheffield, 1999); Reframing Her: Biblical Women in Postcolonial Focus (Sheffield, 2006); Troubling Women and Land: Reading Biblical Texts in Aotearoa New Zealand (Sheffield, 2014). She passed away on February 9, 2019. What a privilege to have received her last contribution and what an honor to be able to publish her essay in this work. In celebration of her life and rich legacy, this volume is dedicated in memory of Judith, a revered feminist postcolonial Bible scholar, colleague, mentor, and teacher. Her feminist spirit lives on in her numerous contributions to feminist biblical studies. Carol Meyers, Ph.D., is the Mary Grace Wilson Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, U.S.A., and past president of the Society of Biblical Literature. Her research interests include Hebrew Bible studies, SyroPalestinian archaeology, and gender in the biblical world. Among her published books are the edited reference work Women in Scripture (Houghton Mifflin 2000), Exodus (Cambridge, 2005), Households and Holiness: The Religious Culture of Israelite Women (Fortress Press, 2005), Excavations at Ancient Nabratein: Syna­gogue and Environs (co-author; Eisenbrauns, 2009), Rediscovering Eve: Ancient Israelite Women in Context (Oxford, 2013), The Bible in the Public Square: Its Enduring Influence in American Life (co-editor; SBL Press, 2014 ) and The Architecture, Stratigraphy, and the Artifacts of the Western Summit of Sepphoris (co-editor; Eisenbrauns, 2018).

list of contributors   xix Sarojini Nadar, Ph.D., holds the Desmond Tutu Research Chair in Religion and Social Justice at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa. The chair focuses on developing and supporting advanced research at the intersections of religion and social justice. Her research interests are in the areas of gender studies and religion, and focuses specifically on physical, sexual, and epistemic violence. Among her publications are African Women, Religion and Health: Essays in Honour of Mercy Amba Oduyoye (Orbis, 2006). Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde, Ph.D., is a researcher at the Gender Unit of the Faculty of Theology at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. Her research focus includes gender and feminist hermeneutics, Old Testament studies, wisdom literature, and African biblical interpretation. Ọlọjẹde is a fellow of the UBIAS Network. She was a researcher at Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, NJ, U.S.A., the Alexander von Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany, and Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Jeremy Punt, Ph.D., is Professor of New Testament in the Theology Faculty at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. His work focuses on biblical hermeneutics, past and present, including critical theory in interpretation, the intersection of biblical and cultural studies, and on the significance of contextual configurations of power and gender, and social systems and identifications for biblical interpretation. Recently he  published Postcolonial Biblical Interpretation: Reframing Paul (Brill, 2015); and he contributes regularly to academic journals and book publications. Adele Reinhartz, Ph.D., is Professor in the Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa, Canada. She has published extensively on the New Testament, Bible and film, and feminist biblical criticism. Her books include Befriending the Beloved Disciple: A Jewish Reading of the Gospel of John (Continuum, 2001); Jesus of Hollywood (Oxford, 2007); Bible and Cinema: An Introduction (Routledge, 2013); and, most recently, Cast Out of the Covenant: Jews and Anti-Judaism in the Gospel of John (Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2018). She served as the General Editor of The Journal of Biblical Literature from 2012–18, and served as President of the Society of Biblical Literature in 2019-2020. She was elected to the Royal Society of Canada in 2005 and to the American Academy of Jewish Research in 2014. Charles M. Rix, Ph.D., is Dean of the College of Humanities and Bible and Associate Professor of Bible at Oklahoma Christian University in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, U.S.A.  His research interests focus on the application of Mikhail Bakhtin’s literary theory and the phenomenology of Emmanuel Levinas to feminist and post-Shoah readings of the Hebrew Bible. His essays appear in Representing the Irreparable: The Shoah, the Bible, and the Art of Samuel Bak (Syracuse University Press, 2008), as well as in the Journal of Cultural and Religious Studies, the Stone-Campbell Journal, and Dialogismos. He is a classical pianist who gives master classes and benefit recitals for humanitarian causes. Aaron Rosen, Ph.D., is Professor of Religion and Visual Culture and Director of the Henry Luce III Center for the Arts & Religion, at Wesley Theological Seminary in

xx   list of contributors Washington, DC, USA. He works on the intersection of religion and visual culture. He is currently writing a book entitled The Hospitality of Images: Modern Art and Interfaith Dialogue. He is the author and editor of many books, including Art and Religion in the 21st Century (Thames and Hudson, 2017); Encounters: The Art of Interfaith Dialogue (Brepols, 2018); and Brushes with Faith (Wipf and Stock, 2019). Linda S. Schearing, Ph.D., is a Professor at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, U.S.A., where she has taught Hebrew Scripture and Women’s Studies from 1993 to 2022. Her academic interests include the history of biblical interpretation, gender studies, and popular culture studies. She is the co-author of Eve & Adam: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Readings on Genesis and Gender (Indiana University Press, 1999); Those Elusive Deuteronomists: Pandeuteronomism and the Hebrew Bible (Bloomsbury, 1999); and Enticed by Eden: How Western Culture Uses, Confuses (And Sometimes Abuses) Adam and Eve (Baylor University Press, 2013). Susanne Scholz, Ph.D., is Professor of Old Testament at Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, Texas, U.S.A. Her research focuses on feminist biblical hermeneutics, the epistemologies and sociologies of biblical interpretation, cultural and literary methodologies, biblical historiography and translation theories, interfaith and interreligious dialog, as well as general issues related to women, gender, and sexuality studies in religion. Among her fourteen books and over sixty essays and journal articles are Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect: Method (Vol. 3) (editor; Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2016); La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent (co-editor; SBL Press, 2016); The Bible as Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible (Fortress Press, 2017); and Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; T&T Clark Bloomsbury, 2017), She is the editor of the book series Feminist Studies and Sacred Texts (Lexington Books). David A. Schones, Ph.D., is Visiting Assistant Professor in Biblical Studies at Austin College in Sherman, Texas, U.S.A. His research focuses on biblical infertility at the intersection of gender and disability studies. His dissertation thesis is entitled “Infertility in 1 Samuel 1: Toward a Hermeneutic of Reproduction.” He published “Buying Biblical Babies: Genesis 16 and Commercial Surrogacy,” in Resonance: A Religious Studies Journal (2017) and “Can I Bring Him Back Again? Infertility and Masculinity,” in Communitas: Journal of Education beyond the Walls (2018). Joy A. Schroeder, Ph.D., is Professor of Church History and holder of the Trinity Chair in Lutheran Heritage at Trinity Lutheran Seminary at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio, U.S.A.  Her research interests include medieval women’s mysticism and the history of biblical interpretation. She is the author of Deborah’s Daughters: Gender Politics and Biblical Interpretation (Oxford University Press, 2014); and the editor and translator of The Book of Genesis and The Book of Jeremiah (Bible in Medieval Tradition Series; William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2015 and 2017).

list of contributors   xxi Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, dr.dr.h.c., is Krister Stendahl Professor at Harvard University and co-founding senior editor of the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion (JFSR). Her teaching, research, and numerous publications focus on questions of biblical and the*logical hermeneutics, ethics, rhetoric, and the politics of interpretation. Her landmark work, In Memory of Her: A Feminist Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins (Crossroad, 1983), has become a classic in biblical studies. Among her latest book publications are Ephesians (Wisdom Commentary Series; Liturgical Press, 2017); and Congress of Wo/men: Religion, Gender and Kyriarchal Power (FSR Inc., 2017). Hanna Stenström, D.  Theol., is Senior Lecturer in New Testament at the University College Stockholm in Sweden. Her research interests are feminist and gender studies, with particular attention to the book of Revelation, and the interpretation history and sociopolitics of biblical scholarship in Sweden. Among her English publications are the following three essays: “Masculine or Feminine? Male Virgins in Joseph and Aseneth and the Book of Revelation” (Mohr Siebeck, 2008); “Is Salvation Only for True Men? On Gendered Imagery in the Book of Revelation” (Peeters, 2011); “Unity and Diversity in Nordic Biblical Scholarship” (SBL Press, 2012). Ken Stone, Ph.D., is Professor of Bible, Culture, and Hermeneutics at Chicago Theological Seminary in Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.  He focuses his research on the relationships between biblical interpretation, critical theories, and matters of gender, sexuality, animals, and ecology. He is the author of several books, including Reading the Hebrew Bible with Animal Studies (2017); and co-editor with Teresa J. Hornsby of Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship (2011). Caryn Tamber-Rosenau, Ph.D., is Instructional Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies and Religious Studies at the University of Houston, Texas, U.S.A. Her research interests include feminist and queer interpretations of the Bible, literature of the Second Temple period, and Jewish reception of the Bible. She is the author of Women in Drag: Gender and Performance in the Hebrew Bible and Early Jewish Literature (Gorgias Press, 2018). Katy E. Valentine, Ph.D., is a New Testament scholar, transformational spiritual coach, and minister in Chico, California, U.S.A.  She researches the relationship between contemporary transgender identities and Scripture with particular interest on gender fluidity in the ancient world as a source of empowerment for trans people today. She is the author of “For You Were Bought with a Price”: Sex, Slavery, and Self-Control in a Pauline Community (GlossaHouse, 2017). Arthur W. Walker-Jones, Ph.D., is currently the United Church of Canada Research Chair in Contemporary Theology and Professor of Religion and Culture at the University of Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada. He specializes in ecocriticism of the Hebrew Bible and the intersections of ecocriticism with feminism, post-colonialism, and animal studies. He is the author of Hebrew for Biblical Interpretation (SBL, 2003); The Green Psalter: Resources for an Ecological Spirituality (Fortress, 2009); and Psalms Book Two: An Earth Bible Commentary: “As a Doe Groans” (T&T Clark, 2019).

xxii   list of contributors Karen Strand Winslow, Ph.D., is Professor of Biblical Studies, Chair of the Biblical and Theological Studies Department, and Director of the Master of Arts in Theological Studies of Azusa Pacific Seminary, Azusa Pacific University, in Azusa, California, U.S.A.  Her research interests cover the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament; women in the Bible, history, and theology; early Judaism; feminist biblical interpretation; and science and theology. Among her publications are Early Jewish and Christian Memories of Moses’ Wives: Exogamist Marriage and Ethnic Identity (2005); and 1 and 2 Kings: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition (New Beacon Bible Commentary Series, 2017). Yani Yoo, Ph.D., is a lecturer at Methodist Theological University in Seoul, Korea. She reads the Bible from feminist and literary viewpoints and is interested in learning and spreading queer interpretations of the Bible. She is the author of The God of Abraham, Rebekah, and Jacob (The Christian Literature Society of Korea, 2009); and From Eve to Esther (The Christian Literature Society of Korea, 2014).

R eading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction Susanne Scholz

The scholarly accomplishments, exegetical innovations, and methodological insights of feminist biblical studies speak for themselves. Yet some sectors of biblical studies and the vast public know almost nothing about these scholarly developments that began in the 1970s. The hegemonic ignorance about feminist biblical studies, however, is not accidental but willfully perpetrated by generation after generation of biblical exegetes. They recognize that patriarchal privilege continues only when kyriarchal theories and practices are continuously proclaimed even if it requires the active exclusion of exegetical, hermeneutical, and methodological excellence. Phallogocentric interpreters do not voluntarily relinquish scholarly, religious, or institutional privileges. At stake is power. Unsurprisingly, then, feminist biblical studies—even after almost fifty years of ongoing scholarly exegesis of the Bible with variously defined feminist, womanist, gendered, and queer hermeneutical stances and articulated within variously developed intersectional manifestations—are still not fully integrated into the academic disciplines of biblical, theological, and religious studies. A brief look at conventional introductory textbooks on the Bible, Old Testament, Hebrew Bible, or New Testament proves this point. Targeting undergraduate and graduate students, most of these books exclude systematic references to feminist biblical exegesis. At the level of religious institutions, such as synagogues or churches, in which the Bible plays a central role as a sacred text, feminist interpretations are also not part and parcel of learning, teaching, and preaching. To this very day, Abraham and Moses, Joshua and David, or Jeremiah and Ezekiel receive primary attention but not Sarah, Hagar, and Miriam, Deborah and Ruth, or the wise women of Endor and Huldah. Patriarchal assumptions uphold sexist, homophobic, and heteronormative beliefs about women, men, and anybody beyond the gender binary.

xxiv   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction It is crucial that feminist Bible scholars, within their various intersectional locations, keep researching, writing, and publishing scholarly works so that the exegetical record is available to everybody who wants to know more about feminist scholarship on the Bible. This Oxford Handbook contributes to this effort. It aims to offer scholarly inspiration, exegetical horizons, and hermeneutical ideas for future explorations in the field of feminist biblical studies. It stands in excellent company with other feminist, womanist, and queer works published during the past five decades.1 Thus, the volume does not claim singularity. Rather, like other comprehensively designed anthologies,2 it illustrates the breadth and depth of feminist scholarship on the Old Testament. Four main areas 1  See, e.g., Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe, eds., Women’s Bible Commentary (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1992; expanded second ed., 1998; third rev. and updated ed.; 2012); Luise Schottroff and Marie-Theres Wacker, eds., Feminist Biblical Interpretation: A Compendium of Critical Commentary on the Books of the Bible and Related Literature, trans. Lisa E. Dahill, Everett R. Kalin, Nancy Lukens, Linda M. Maloney, Barbara Rumscheidt, Martin Rumscheidt, and Tina Steiner (Grand Rapids, MI / Cambridge: William B. Eerdmans, 2012); Gregg Drinkwater, Joshua Lesser, and David Shneer, eds., Torah Queeries: Weekly Commentaries on the Hebrew Bible (New York, NY / London: New York University Press, 2009); Tamara Cohn Eshkenazi and Andrea L. Weiss, eds., The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (New York, NY: WRJ/URJ Press, 2008); Deryn Guest, Robert E. Goss, Mona West, and Thomas Bohache, eds., The Queer Bible Commentary (London: SCM Press, 2006); Catherine Clark Kroeger and Mary J. Evans, eds., The IVP Women’s Bible Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002). The first comprehensively designed feminist Hebrew Bible series was edited by Athalya Brenner from 1993–2001, with one co-edited volume. All volumes were published by Sheffield Academic Press. They are: A Feminist Companion to Genesis (1993); A Feminist Companion to Judges (1993); A Feminist Companion to the Song of Songs (1993); A Feminist Companion to Ruth (1993); A Feminist Companion to Samuel to Kings (l 994); A Feminist Companion to Wisdom Literature (1995); A Feminist Companion to Esther. Judith, and Susannah (1995); A Feminist Companion to the Latter Prophets (1995); A Feminist Companion to the Hebrew Bible in the New Testament (1996); Brenner and Carole R. Fontaine, eds., A Feminist Companion to Reading of the Bible (2001). The second series was also published by Athalya Brenner from 1998 to 2002 (with the exception of one co-edited volume) and published with Sheffield Academic Press: Genesis: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (l998); Judges: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (1999); Ruth and Esther: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (1999): Samuel and Kings: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (2000); Exodus and Deuteronomy: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series)(1998); The Song of Songs: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (2000); Prophets and Daniel: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (2002); Brenner and Fontaine (eds.), Wisdom and Psalms: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series) (1998). The editor of the New Testament series is Amy-Jill Levine, publishing a growing series with Bloomsbury Publishing since 2000. 2  See, e.g., Yvonne Sherwood, ed., The Bible and Feminism: Remapping the Field (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017); Linda Day and Carolyn Pressler, eds., Engaging the Bible in a Gendered World: An Introduction to Feminist Biblical Interpretation in Honor of Katharine Doob Sakenfeld (Louisville, KY / London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006); Alice Bach, ed., Women in the Hebrew Bible: A Reader (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1999); Harold C. Washington, Susan Lochrie Graham, and Pamela Thimmes, eds., Escaping Eden: New Feminist Perspectives on the Bible (New York, NY: New York University Press, 1999). The projected fifty-eight volumes of the feminist commentary series, Wisdom Commentary, are published by Liturgical Press. The series is currently the most ambitious project in feminist biblical studies. The twenty-two volumes of The Bible and Women encyclopedia are produced as an ongoing international collaboration in which each volume is published in four languages (English, German, Italian, Spanish) and published by four presses: the SBL Press, Kohlhammer, Editorial Verbo Divino, and Il Pozzo di Giacobbe (http://www.bibleandwomen.org/EN/index.php).

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxv or­gan­ize the current exegetical, hermeneutical, and methodological discourses pursued in feminist Hebrew Bible studies. They relate to globalization, neoliberalism, (digital) media cultures, and various intersectional articulations. Although this anthology offers an impressively diverse lineup, no anthology can exhaustively cover the entirety of the field. On top of this expected limitation, several contributors jumped ship for all kinds of reasons, despite initial invitations and commitments. While extensive, the volume thus offers only a sampling of what is available in feminist biblical exegesis today. Still, thirty-seven essays await interested readers. The central and guiding principle for commissioning the essays was grounded in the goal to produce a book that will guide feminist biblical research into an exciting scholarly future. Detailed surveys or diligent summaries of past accomplishments were outside the scope of the assignment. In fact, my three anthologies, entitled Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect, Vol. 1: Biblical Books; Vol. 2: Social Location; Vol. 3: Methods, collect, describe, and assess past and present accomplishments and directions in feminist biblical scholarship.3 The present book serves as an unofficial fourth volume to the three previous volumes, offering ideas, suggestions, and positions about the current development of feminist Old Testament studies. The four categories of globalization, neoliberalism, (digital) media cultures, and intersectionality constitute the intellectual arenas in which contemporary feminist scholars have creatively and productively examined biblical texts, biblical interpretation histories, and biblical discourses in recent years. Admittedly, other organizing categories exist, not least the conventional text-fetishized system, still dominating the academic field of the Bible, that categorizes the study of the Bible according to its books. Old-fashioned and predictable approaches, however, seem too narrow to offer a vibrant future for feminist biblical exegesis in a world that questions, if not outright rejects, the merits of biblical studies as an academic field. This is a time of dramatic change, and so this collection of essays aims to contribute to exegetical, hermeneutical, and methodological “innovation” and “excellence” of feminist biblical studies.4 While biblical texts, topics, and issues remain central concerns in all of the thirty-seven essays, each contribution moves beyond past accomplishments. Without aiming to supersede them, each essay invites readers to think anew about the purpose of biblical interpretation, the viability of feminist, womanist, gendered, and queer concerns for the reading of biblical texts, and the relations of both purpose and viability of the Bible in a world in which millions of people read its texts daily. I for one would love to come back in 150 years to discover if this Handbook has encouraged, inspired, and supported future Bible scholars to go boldly into exegetical, hermeneutical, and methodological directions 3  Sheffield Phoenix Press published them in 2013, 2014, and 2016 respectively. 4  For the critical analysis of concepts, such as innovation or excellence, as integral to the anti-feminist academic shift to neoliberalism and even U.S.-American fascism, see, e.g., Henry A. Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2014); Mitchum Huehls and Rachel Greenwald Smith, eds., Neoliberalism and Contemporary Literary Culture (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2017); Henry A. Giroux, American Nightmare: Facing the Challenge of Fascism (San Francisco, CA: City Lights Bookstore, 2018).

xxvi   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction as suggested by this or that essay. This kind of impact would be my sincere wish although our era does not give much reason to be optimistic about the future of planet Earth.

The Historical Journey of Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies Feminist Bible scholarship has come a long way. It started with exegetical works on “women” of the Bible, but the field has moved beyond essentializing and naturalizing gender discourse. Intersectional considerations about gender in light of race, class, geopolitics, or even age characterize feminist biblical scholarship as exegetes examine the cultural, political, and explicitly religious positions in relation to biblical texts, characters, or topics. Yet the essentializing and naturalizing category of woman was the foundation for feminist interpretation in the 1970s, leading to significant scholarly fruits in the 1980s and 1990s. Without the groundbreaking focus on women as a succinct political category, feminist biblical studies would probably not have come into existence. The arrival of postmodern feminist theories in the 1990s expanded the essentializing and naturalizing dynamics of the category of woman to include gender, queer, masculinity, and sexuality as intersectional categories. This development enabled feminist biblical exegetes to theorize the socio-political, economic, cultural, and religious dynamics that are involved when we examine the Bible and its interpretation histories. Queer scholarship, in particular, has ensured that assumptions about the gender binary of female and male are recognized as heteronormative constructs that stabilize, essentialize, and thus limit the analysis of gender in problematic ways. Today, mostly religiously conservative scholars still look for women in the Bible, ignoring the theoretical insights about the study of gender, queer, masculinity, or sexuality studies. Yet it must be acknowledged that without women scholars the field of feminist biblical studies would not have come into existence. It required academically credentialed and exegetically committed feminists of the 1970s to take seriously the androcentric, patriarchal, and heteronormative structures of oppression dominating their religious traditions and the academic study of the Bible. Prior to the ground-breaking feminist biblical scholarship of the 1970s only some relatively isolated and largely forgotten women writers and political activists for women’s suffrage and the abolition of slavery argued for women’s civil and political rights. Depending on the century in which they lived, they hailed from the local aristocracy or from religious orders during the European Middle Ages, or they were faithful lay members of Christian or Jewish traditions in the sixteenth century. A considerable number of them worked for the abolition of slavery and women’s suffrage in the nineteenth century. Several of them argued like second-wave feminists although the latter knew little about them in the 1960s and the 1970s. Most of the writings did not make it into the elite, white, male, Western, European, and Christian-secularized scholarship of the Bible. The early works were thus largely ignored and forgotten for centuries until contemporary feminist research brought them back to light.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxvii Luckily, some literary records of women reading the Bible in favor of women’s equality and civil rights survived since the European Middle Ages. One of the medieval writers is the Italian writer, Christine de Pizan (1364–1430), who published in French. She was a prolific author who wrote poetry and prose. In her work, Le Livre de la Cité des Dames (1405; The Book of the City of Ladies), she elaborated on heroic and virtuous women. She also defended women’s equality on the basis of her reading of Genesis 1–3, maintaining that woman, like man, was not only created in God’s image but also made of much better material than man. Woman was taken from human flesh whereas man was only made from soil. Moreover, de Pizan observed that the location of woman’s creation was better than man’s. Eve was created in paradise, and so her noble nature was guaranteed by God. To de Pizan, woman was God’s masterpiece, the culmination of Creation.5 Later women writers also highlighted biblical women’s accomplishments to argue for women’s equality in society. For instance, Argula von Grumback (1492–1554?) and Marie Dentièr (1495–1561) mention Deborah of Judges 4–5 as a powerful biblical figure who demonstrates that women ought to have a public voice and public capabilities.6 In fact, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, European women published their views about biblical women in unprecedented numbers. They challenged conventional readings of female characters, their intellect, and their roles. The biblical woman Deborah inspired many of them to repel misogynistic attacks and to fight off their opponents to women’s equality.7 The nineteenth century saw a meteoric rise of women’s voices, particularly among politically engaged U.S. Christian leaders, such as Sarah Moore Grimké (1792–1873), Sojourner Truth (1797–1883), Angelina Grimké Weld (1805–79), Phoebe Palmer (1807–74), Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–96), or Grace Aguilar (1816–47).8 Perhaps the most well-known nineteenth-century woman interpreter is the renowned U.S.-American suffragist and abolitionist, Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902). Stanton gathered a team of like-minded white women to interpret the Bible against the status quo of patriarchal order and social hierarchies. She considered the Bible as the original cause of women’s oppression and was convinced that only a systematic study of oppressive biblical passages would dismantle sexist forces in society and lead to women’s equality. Stanton wanted to dispel women’s attraction to religion by showing religion’s deep complicity with androcentric, patriarchal domination. Her landmark anthology, The Woman’s Bible (1895 and 1898), exposed the negative influence of the Bible on women’s 5  For more details, see, e.g., Bonnie Birk, Christine de Pizan and Biblical Wisdom: A Feminist-Theological Point of View (Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press, 2005). 6  For more details, see, e.g., Joy A. Schroeder, Deborah’s Daughters: Gender Politics and Biblical Interpretation (Oxford / New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2014), 73–75. 7  Schroeder provides a plethora of detailed references and sources for this time period; see Deborah’s Daughters, 106–38. 8  For details on these nineteenth-century women readers of the Bible and other women readers who lived in earlier centuries, see, e.g., Marion Ann Taylor and Agnes Choi, eds., Handbook of Women Biblical Interpreters (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2012). For specific volumes on nineteenth-century women readers, see Marion Ann Taylor and Christiana de Groot, eds., Women of War Women of Woe: Joshua and Judges through the Eyes of Nineteenth-Century Female Biblical Interpreters (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016); Marion Ann Taylor and Heather E. Weir, eds., Let Her Speak for Herself: Nineteenth-Century Women Writing on Women in Genesis (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2006).

xxviii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction status throughout Western history. Stanton believed that “[s]o long as tens of thousands of Bibles are printed every year, and circulated over the whole habitable globe, and the masses in all English-speaking nations revere it as the word of God, it is vain to belittle its influence.”9 To be sure, Stanton’s vision was impaired with respect to race, class, and anti-Judaism; here she wore the same biased lenses as her male contemporaries. Yet for the time in which she lived, Stanton was a courageous visionary in her insistence that the Bible itself must be understood as an androcentric product, and women’s social and political equality could not be achieved without confronting the patriarchal nature of the scriptures. Stanton was profoundly frustrated with organized religion and not afraid to say so. For instance, she told a collaborator of The Woman’s Bible: “If we who do see the absurdities of old superstitions never unveil them to others, how is the world to make any progress in the theologies? I am in the sunset of life, and I feel it to be my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear, instead of echoing worn-out opinions.”10 Repeatedly she pointed to the equal gender qualities of God when she discussed the second creation account with an emphasis on Gen. 2:21­–25. As many feminist interpreters before and after her, she praised the first creation account in Genesis 1 because it “dignifies woman as an important factor in the creation, equal in power and glory with man” whereas [t]he second makes her a mere afterthought.”11 It was clear to Stanton that “some wily writer, seeing the perfect equality of man and woman in the first chapter, felt it important for the dignity and dominion of man to effect woman’s subordination in some way.”12 The bias of the biblical writer and no divinely ordained order, she argued, led to woman’s secondary status in this creation account. As a result, Genesis 1 was Stanton’s preferred narrative, and in typical Christian fashion Stanton referred to Gal. 3:28 to underline the validity of Genesis 1. She also used the biblical passages to criticize church policy: “With this recognition of the feminine element in the Godhead in the Old Testament, and this declaration of the equality of the sexes in the News, we may well wonder at the contemptible status woman occupies in the Christian church to-day.”13 What emerges from Stanton’s comments in The Women’s Bible is a strong commitment to interpret the Bible as an androcentric product, which has to be demolished and left behind in order to free women from male domination. After women in Western countries gained the right to vote shortly after the First World War, a period of slow, if not stalled, progress for women’s rights began.14 It lasted until the late 1960s when the Women’s Liberation Movement emerged. During these decades many of the arguments and accomplishments of the suffragettes were quickly forgotten. Few women were admitted to the ranks of academia and even less made it as 9  Elizabeth Cady Stanton, “Introduction,” in The Woman’s Bible (reprint; Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press, 1993), 11. 10  Quoted in Katie Kern, Ms. Stanton’s Bible (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001), 19. 11  Stanton, “Comments on Genesis,” in Women’s Bible, 20. 12  Ibid., 21. 13  Ibid., 21. 14  For additional information, see Susanne Scholz, Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; London / New York, NY: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017), 13–42, esp. 19–23.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxix biblical scholars, and those who did worked in isolation enjoying little academic ­support and collegiality. Some managed to publish treatises on women and the Hebrew Bible, but these works did not share the intellectual fervor and political zeal of de Pizan or Stanton. The later studies signaled religious-conservative convictions as they attempted to establish investigations on biblical women as legitimate historical-literary or spiritual pursuits. They did not engage the Bible as a text with contemporary socio-political significance for women’s equality and civil rights. Yet all of the writings indicate that women have always actively and independently read the Bible. It is true that many of them were the recipients of biblical meanings as handed down and interpreted by androcentric religious institutions. It was also often dangerous for women to speak publicly in front of women and men. Yet alongside this baleful tradition was an alternative experience: again and again, women of high intellect, great independence, and strong conviction challenged male political and religious leaders to accept women’s equality with men not only before God but also in society. By raising their voices, women who often came from religious orders or the upper classes tried to defeat with their words entrenched structures of sexism, misogyny, and pa­tri­ archy. Sometimes, especially when they came from the underprivileged strata of society, their lone voices connected the discrimination of women to other structures of domination, including racism or classism, demanding to abolish all of them. Thus, the existing historical documents of pre-twentieth-century women interpreting the Bible illustrate that Bible-reading women did not always submit to kyriarchal, androcentric, and patriarchal thought and practice. They managed to think for themselves, to raise pertinent questions related to gender oppression in their societies, and to envision gender justice as a way of life. That we do not currently know the works of non-Western women reading the Bible indicates the limitations of the chronological and geopolitical record available in the Western, European, and Christian centric interpretation histories of the Bible. The dearth of feminist Bible interpretations changed when academically credentialed feminist Bible scholars began publishing their research in academic journals and by academic publishing houses since the 1970s. In alignment with the Women’s Liberation Movement, feminist Bible scholars classified their works as feminist and later also as womanist, a term increasingly used by African American women scholars.15 Especially since the 1990s, but already earlier, feminist Bible research often intersected with other socio-political categories, such as race, class, sexuality, religious tradition, disability, or geopolitics.16 As the United States was the hegemonic-imperial nation by the 1970s and English had become the lingua franca in the world, U.S.-American scholars came to 15  For an introduction to womanist biblical hermeneutics, see, e.g., Gay L. Byron and Vanessa Lovelace, eds., Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016); Nyasha Junior, An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2015). 16  For a selective discussion of the various intersectional connections, see, e.g., Susanne Scholz, ed., Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect, Vol. 2: Social Location (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2014); Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed., Feminist Bible Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement (Bible and Women 9.1; Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014).

xxx   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction dominate feminist biblical exegesis. The existing scholarly infrastructures of the American Academy of Religion (AAR) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) provided feminist scholars in religious, theological, and biblical studies with regular networking opportunities that other countries lacked. The annual conferences of the AAR and SBL that currently draw about ten thousand attendees have ensured that feminist scholars and activists from the North American continent and increasingly also from around the globe meet regularly since the 1970s. The Jewish feminist scholar and past president of the AAR, Judith Plaskow, remembers these developments when she writes: The 1970s was a pivotal decade. . . . The women who gathered in Atlanta at the joint meeting of the American Academy of Religion and Society of Biblical Literature in November of 1971 founded both a caucus to take up political and professional issues of concern to women in the academy and a program unit—the Working Group on Women and Religion—to share emerging research. . . . In 1975, the opening panel of the new Women and Religion section showcased the methodologies that had emerged in four years of work and called for a paradigm shift from the androcentric model of humanity in which only men represent the human to a model in which women and men “are coequally modes of the human, and, therefore, coequally subjects of . . . research.”17

Other conferences and workshops were also part of the rise of feminist studies in religion, theology, and biblical studies. The pioneering phase was as exhilarating as it was scary. Everything had to be invented because feminist Bible scholars did not know anything about the work accomplished by their proto-feminist foremothers. The exposure of patriarchy and sexism was revolutionary, and Mary Daly’s call to say “ ‘No’ to [current] values, norms and structures of the church” gave courage and confidence to many other religious feminists and secular feminists interested in religion.18 Plaskow confirms the significance of the 1970s for the development of feminist biblical studies when she comments on this early phase in feminist biblical studies: [T]he 1970s saw the emergence of feminist work on the Bible that was explicitly grounded in and supportive of the revolution in women’s self-understandings and social roles. As feminists brought new questions to biblical texts, they began both to uncover the lineaments of women’s “herstory” buried within androcentric frameworks and to develop exegetical and hermeneutical tools for understanding and evaluating the significance of biblical perspectives on women. The foundations were laid for the flowering of feminist biblical scholarship in the 1980s and 1990s that

17  Judith Plaskow, “Movement and Emerging Scholarship: Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the 1970s in the United States,” in Feminist Biblical Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement, ed. Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza (The Bible and Women 9.1; Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014), 23, 24–25. 18  Ibid., 22.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxxi would see the entry of women of color, out lesbians, and Jewish women into an increasingly rich and multifaceted conversation.19

These feminist Bible scholars, like feminist religion scholars in general, committed themselves to feminist work in their fields. They ignored the warning voices of secondwave feminists who advised “to give the whole thing [religion] up as a bad job, a dead horse which it is pointless to flog any further.”20 Instead, they have resisted, dismantled, opposed, reconstructed, and reinterpreted biblical texts, concepts, and assumptions as deeply linked to past and present sexism, misogyny, androcentrism, and heteronormativity in their various intersectional manifestations.21

Current Challenges to Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies After five decades of developing feminist Hebrew Bible scholarship, it should not be surprising that feminist Bible scholars wonder about the next step. After almost every biblical woman character has been identified, every scholarly method applied, and practically every biblical text analyzed for its gender ideology,22 the question is, what remains to be done if we do not want to merely give in to the neoliberal status quo? Perhaps this is one of the reasons why feminist biblical scholars are currently in the proc­ess of surveying and assessing the field. For instance, Athalya Brenner poses the following questions when she reflects on the future of the field: Quo vadis, feminist biblical scholarship? . . . What is beckoning? Where do you want to go? Is the Master’s House still the house you long to possess, only that you would like to become its legitimate(d) masters and mistresses instead of marginal(ized) lodgers? Would you like to move it (houses can be moved now from one location to another)? . . . Will an act of exchanging places within the accepted power paradigms be the object of desire? Are new structures of dominance, a shift in majority/minority balances, being implemented? Are you, we, aspiring to conquistador positions in the names of the proverbial “oppressed”? Should we not simply demolish the house 19  Plaskow, “Movement and Emerging Scholarship,” 34. 20  So Alison Jasper, “Raising the Dead? Reflections of Feminist Biblical Criticism in the Light of Pamela Sue Anderson’s Book A Feminist Philosophy of Religion, 1988,” Feminist Theology 9.26 (January 2001): 110. 21  For a more detailed historical outline, see, e.g., Susanne Scholz, “From the ‘Woman’s Bible’ to the ‘Women’s Bible’: The History of Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible,” chap. in Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017), 13–42. 22  Carol Meyers, Toni Craven, and Ross S. Kramer, eds., Women in Scripture: A Dictionary of Named and Unnamed Women in the Hebrew Bible, the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books, and the New Testament (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 2000).

xxxii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction instead of merely deconstructing it and its inhabitants, in order to build a completely new one instead? And if so, who will get right of occupation in the new house, and on what terms? . . . The contenders are many and the audiences are dwindling, as we are becoming more and more radicalized. Whose scholarship will matter, say, twenty-five years hence?23

Brenner wonders about the existing power hierarchies, as feminist Bible scholars adapt to the status quo or change it. It is a reflection on the in-house situation of feminist Bible studies in the early part of the twenty-first century. Yet Brenner’s concerns do not address the larger intellectual and societal developments, in contrast to Pamela Milne, who considers the political and social implications of biblical exegesis for women in the past and the present. As she observes an increasing professionalization and depoliticization of feminist Bible work since the 1970s, she worries about feminist interpreters being co-opted into supporting the status quo.24 Others, such as Deryn Guest, recommend that feminist biblical scholarship “tool up and become even more expansively theory-rich, able to bring the critical studies of masculinities, queer studies, trans studies, intersex studies, and lesbian and gay studies into negotiation with feminist theory without necessarily privileging what have been, to date, stalwart feminist positions.”25 Still others observe that feminist biblical exegetes need to be committed to intersectional hermeneutics and take seriously connections to racism, classism, homophobia, disability, or geopolitics.26 It also seems clear that in the early decades of the second millennium ce, North American feminist biblical research is dealing with several new challenges. One challenge is related to the function of feminist biblical scholarship within the institutional framework of higher education. Another challenge comes from the Christian Right, which has taken on the issue of women and gender in numerous publications widely distributed to lay audiences. Yet another challenge—probably the most intellectually productive—pushes feminist studies toward investigations of “otherness” of all sorts, such as queer, ethnicity and race, and postcolonial studies. First, North American feminist biblical scholarship has primarily developed within institutions of higher education and has become part of undergraduate and graduate departments of religious and theological studies and seminaries. This development 23  Athalya Brenner, “Epilogue: Babies and Bathwater on the Road,” in Her Master’s Tools? Feminist and Postcolonial Engagements of Historical-Critical Discourse, ed. Caroline Vander Stichele and Todd Penner (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2005), 338. 24  Pamela J. Milne, “Toward Feminist Companionship: The Future of Feminist Biblical Studies and Feminism,” in A Feminist Companion to Reading the Bible: Approaches, Methods, and Strategies, ed. Athalya Brenner and Carole Fontaine (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 53. 25  Deryn Guest, Beyond Feminist Biblical Studies (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012), 150. 26  See, e.g., L. Juliana Claasens and Carolyn J. Sharp, eds., Feminist Frameworks and the Bible: Power, Ambiguity, and Intersectionality (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2019); Johanna Stiebert and Musa W. Dube, eds., The Bible, Centres and Margins: Dialogues between Postcolonial African and British Scholars (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018); Mitzi J. Smith, ed., I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2015); Hisako Kinukawa, ed., Migration and Diaspora: Exegetical Voices of Women in Northeast Asian Countries (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014).

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxxiii means that feminist biblical scholars have not only to earn the usual academic credentials and to comply with established standards of tenure and promotion, but they also have to adapt to the dominant academic discourses and scholarly norms in their teaching and research. Esther Fuchs elaborates on the implications of these dynamics for feminist biblical work within the discipline of biblical studies when she writes: Though feminist scholarship has decidedly made serious inroads into biblical studies, the academic process of evaluation that decides who receives a grant and who gets published and where is still largely in male hands. Feminist students must get the approval of malestream professors, and even feminist professors continue to depend on malestream colleagues and administrators for approval and advancement. That male scholars continue to control the means of production of feminist knowledge means that this knowledge has been interpreted largely as yet another ingredient to be added to and stirred into the pot of biblical studies. The current cooptation of feminist studies makes it impossible to use it as a means of transforming the entire field of biblical studies into an ethically committed and institutionally independent field that values both social action and scholarship.27

Scholars of the dominant status quo evaluate publications, grants, and the development of feminist knowledge. The feminist call to action—one of the initial drives of feminist scholarship in the 1970s—has all too often become secondary, and the impetus towards sociopolitical, economic, and cultural transformation is neglected. Perhaps unsurprisingly, then, feminist biblical research has turned into increasingly specialized, depoliticized, and co-opted projects that comply with dominant standards, norms, and expectations. As Caroline Vander Stichele and Todd Penner observe, the guild of biblical studies “maintains a strong line of male-identified scholarly assessment and production”28 and “the difference that is tolerated does not challenge the phallocentric and colonial structures of the guild” but rather contributes to “solidify its hold.”29 Feminist biblical scholarship, like other marginalized discourses by the “excluded other,” functions as a “fetish” and “is granted access to the formal structure as a beneficent gesture.”30 As a result, in North American institutions of higher education, feminist biblical research often serves as an add-on to the existing academic content management and distribution systems. Feminist biblical scholars must adapt to dominant academic expectations, the evaluation procedures of publishers, and the waning feminist sensibilities of their students. Moreover, as Milne notes, the emergence of feminist biblical studies and the inclusion of “others” into the field of biblical studies have concurrently

27  Esther Fuchs, “Points of Resonance,” in On the Cutting Edge: The Study of Women in Biblical Worlds, ed. Jane Schaberg, Alice Bach, and Esther Fuchs (New York, NY: Continuum, 2004), 12. See also her work titled Sexual Politics in the Biblical Narrative: Reading the Hebrew Bible as a Woman (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2000). 28  Caroline Vander Stichele and Todd Penner, Contextualizing Gender in Early Christian Discourse: Thinking Beyond Thecla (New York, NY: Continuum, 2009), 169. 29  Ibid., 170. 30  Ibid., 169.

xxxiv   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction led to “the devaluing of the field that we can now observe at many institutions.”31 She insists that this development “may well be linked to the fact that what was once a virtually all-male discipline is no longer so.”32 Hector Avalos goes even further. He states that “the SBL is the agent of a dying profession” because it lacks teaching positions at credible academic institutions.33 In this situation of gradually disappearing teaching positions, the “long-term viability” of feminist biblical scholarship is at stake, because innovation is “endangered or at least impeded.”34 Because of the survival mode in the humanities, the impetus toward maintaining the status quo discourages bold proposals for epistemological and hermeneutical change, including those from feminist biblical scholars.35 At their best, then, feminist biblical scholars contribute to developing, promoting, and cultivating textual interpretations as “site[s] of struggle”36 focused on issues that are “our own in this present world.”37 In other words, the ongoing marginalization of feminist biblical work in institutions of higher education has dampened the powerful energies that were set free in the 1970s. Second, the Christian Right and its plethora of publications on women, gender, and the Bible present another considerable challenge to North American feminist biblical studies, although it remains largely unacknowledged on either side. Beginning in the 1990s and then forcefully propelled into the public during the new millennium, proponents of conservative-fundamentalist Christianity have published many books and anthologies on gender and the Bible. Defining themselves as complementarians, they have taken on writers and theologians within their own religious context, contesting egalitarian positions about women and men in church and society. The mostly male and white authors are often powerful leaders in evangelical organizations, particularly the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.38 What is striking about the complementarian Christian Right’s discourse on gender and the Bible is its disregard for feminist biblical scholarship as it has emerged in academic discourse since the 1970s. Although many complementarian authors are seminary 31  Milne, “Toward Feminist Companionship,” 43. 32 Ibid. 33  Hector Avalos, The End of Biblical Studies (Amherst, NY: Prometheus, 2007), 316. 34  Milne, “Toward Feminist Companionship,” 43. 35  See, e.g., Marc Bousquet, How the University Works: Higher Education and the Low-Wage Nation (New York, NY: New York University Press, 2008). 36  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007), 254. 37  Vander Stichele and Penner, Contextualizing Gender, 173. For books that take seriously contemporary issues of the world today, see, e.g., Anne F. Elvey, An Ecological Feminist Reading of the Gospel of Luke: A Gestational Paradigm (Lewiston, NY: Mellen, 2005); Deryn Guest, When Deborah Met Jael: Lesbian Biblical Hermeneutics (London: SCM, 2005); Carole R. Fontaine, With Eyes of Flesh: The Bible, Gender and Human Rights (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2008); Susanne Scholz, Sacred Witness: Rape in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2010). 38  See the online presence of the CBMW at http://www.cbmw.org. For an analysis of the complementarians, see Susanne Scholz, “The Christian Right’s Discourse on Gender and the Bible,” JFSR 21.1 (2005): 81–100. See also Karen Strand Winslow, “Recovering Redemption for Women: Feminist Exegesis in North American Evangelism,” in Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect (Vol. 2: Social Location), ed. Susanne Scholz (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2014), 269–89.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxxv professors, such as John Piper and Wayne A. Grudem, their books do not engage academic feminist and nonfeminist biblical scholarship even when they discuss biblical passages, such as Gen. 1–3, Eph. 5:21–33, Col. 3:18–19, or 1 Tim. 2:11–15. As a result of the Christian Right’s conservative sociopolitical and theological discourse, feminist exegetes continue combating the most basic and persistent androcentric views on women, gender, and the Bible that they have been deconstructing for decades. The emergence of evangelical publications, such as The IVP Women’s Bible Commentary, edited by Catherine Clark Kroeger and Mary J. Evans,39 contributes to the confusion about the nature, goals, and positions of feminist biblical scholarship. Many lay readers do not distinguish between a women’s commentary emerging from an evangelicaltheological context and feminist biblical books published within the academic field of biblical studies and descending from the feminist movement of the 1970s. Thus, evangelical-conservative books on women, gender, and the Bible remain within the boundaries of a socio-theologically conservative hermeneutics.40 Third, investigations on “otherness” related to queer studies, ethnicity and race, and postcolonialism also challenge early feminist academic discourse on the Bible, but these studies also constitutes an intellectually very productive turn for feminist biblical research. Publications such as the Queer Bible Commentary and other anthologies and monographs on queer biblical interpretations41 have urged feminist biblical scholars to open up to LGBTQI issues. For instance, Guest observes the prevalence of a “heteropatriarchal

39  Catherine Clark Kroeger and Mary J. Evans, eds., The IVP Women’s Bible Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002). 40  See, e.g., recent publications by theologically conservative publishing houses: Stephen J. Binz, Women of the Gospels: Friends and Disciples of Jesus (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos, 2011); Binz, Women of the Torah: Matriarchs and Heroes of Israel (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos, 2011); Robin Gallaher Branch, Jeroboam’s Wife: The Enduring Contributions of the Old Testament’s Least-Known Women (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2009); Lynn H. Cohick, Women in the World of the Earliest Christians: Illuminating Ancient Ways of Life (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009); Tammi J. Schneider, Mothers of Promise: Women in the Book of Genesis (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008). 41  Deryn Guest, Robert E. Goss, Mona West, and Thomas Bohache, eds., The Queer Bible Commentary (London: SMC, 2006); Robert E. Goss and Mona West, eds., Take Back the Word: A Queer Reading of the Bible (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2000). See also Guest, When Deborah Met Jael; Theodore W. Jennings, Jacob’s Wound: Homoerotic Narrative in the Literature of Ancient Israel (New York, NY: Continuum, 2005); Theodore W. Jennings, The Man Jesus Loved: Homoerotic Narratives from the New Testament (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2003); Robert E. Goss, Queering Christ: Beyond Jesus Acted Up (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2002); Ken Stone, Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2001); Ken Stone, Practicing Safer Texts: Food, Sex and Bible in Queer Perspective (London: T&T Clark, 2005); Stephen D. Moore, God’s Beauty Parlor: And Other Queer Spaces in and around the Bible (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2001); Daniel A. Helminiak, What the Bible Really Says about Homosexuality (Tajique, NM: Alamo Square Press, 2000); Stephen D. Moore, God’s Gym: Divine Male Bodies of the Bible (New York, NY: Routledge, 1996); Bernadette J. Brooten, Love Between Women: Early Christian Responses to Female Homoeroticism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996); Nancy Wilson, Our Tribe: Queer Folks, God, Jesus, and the Bible (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1995).

xxxvi   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction framework” in feminist biblical studies that sheds light on women in the Bible but does not explicitly consider lesbian hermeneutical concerns. She writes: Feminists and womanists have done sterling work; shedding light on the role and status of scriptural women, asking new questions, modifying and challenging existing methodologies, raising issues not traditionally incorporated within historical critical exegesis. However, almost the entirety of this work has taken place within a heterocentric frame of reference; one that assumes the heterosexuality of the scriptural women themselves; one that appears to presuppose a heterosexual academic community, since lesbian-related concerns and issues have hardly been given a sentence until very recently. . . . Yet, for all this good work, the framework of enquiry has remained predominantly heterocentric.42

Guest grants a few exceptions in feminist biblical studies,43 but overall she charges that female homoeroticism has been pushed into a space of “invisibility” due to the dominant “heteropatriarchal framework”44 of academia and society. Also Ken Stone encourages connections between feminist and queer biblical studies because “feminism, too, is devoted to the critical analysis of sex and gender.”45 To him, a critical gender analysis should not be limited to “biblical representations of women” but extend “to biblical representations of men and of ‘masculinity.’ ”46 In a way, then, queer biblical scholarship advances the work in feminist biblical studies as it “problematize[s] normative approaches to sexuality” and deconstructs “such dichotomies as ‘homosexual/heterosexual’ and ‘male/female.’ ”47 In short, LGBTQI exegesis aims to disrupt “sex-gender-sexuality norms and academic conventions, playful and at times purposefully irreverent”48 and to expand feminist research beyond the analysis of “woman” or “women.” Similarly, the emergence of studies on race and ethnicity has opened up feminist exegesis to perspectives from Asian American feminists and feminist scholars from minoritized North American communities.49 Key in such explorations has been the hermeneutical insight that flesh-and-blood readers are central to the exegetical task of contextualizing biblical meanings in today’s world.50 Combined with postcolonial sensibilities, Mai-Anh Le Tran presents Lot’s wife, Ruth, and the Vietnamese figure Tô Thị 42 Guest, When Deborah Met Jael, 107. 43  Ibid., 108. 44  Ibid., 112. 45 Stone, Queer Commentary, 25. 46  Ibid., 26. 47  Ibid., 27. 48  Guest et al., Queer Bible Commentary, xiii. 49  See, e.g., Mary F. Foskett and Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan, eds., Ways of Being, Ways of Reading: Asian American Biblical Interpretation (St. Louis, KY: Chalice, 2006); Randall C. Bailey, Tat-siong Benny Liew and Fernando F. Segovia, eds., They Were All Together in One Place? Toward Minority Biblical Criticism (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2009). 50  For the significance of the flesh-and-blood readers, see the very influential volumes by Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert, eds., Reading from This Place (Vol. 1: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in the United States; Vol. 2: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective) (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995). For a more recent elaboration, see, e.g., Fernando F. Segovia, “Cultural Criticism: Expanding the Scope of Biblical Criticism,” in The Future of the Biblical Past: Envisioning Biblical Studies on a Global Key, ed. Roland Boer and Fernando F. Segovia (Semeia Studies 66; Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012), 307–37.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxxvii as female characters “that liberate rather than dominate.”51 Also Gale A. Yee problematizes the methodological, hermeneutical, and political soundness of ethnic/racial identity of biblical readers. She wonders what defines “my Asian Americanness, and how does this identity affect my biblical interpretation?”52 In addition, postcolonial feminist studies on the Bible have emerged not only from North America but from other contexts as well.53 In sum, a current goal of feminist biblical studies is to bring feminist scholars of  different social locations and hermeneutical and methodological assumptions together to find common ground in the academic study of biblical literature, history, and tradition.54 In light of the institutional challenges, the Christian Right’s insistence on essentialized views on the gender binary, and the push toward investigations of “otherness,” dialogical conversations, and collaborations among feminist Bible scholars are sorely needed.

Central Issues for Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies The challenges have also forced feminist Hebrew Bible researchers to deliberate on how not to get bogged down in conventionally defined scholarly conversations and disputes in biblical studies. It does not suffice to adapt into the existing scholarly framework divorced from contemporary debates, struggles, and issues in the world, and thereby to contribute to the perpetuation of structures of domination, such as colonialism, racism, ethnonationalism, ageism, anti-ecology, or able-bodied rhetoric. A prominent issue for feminist deliberations is the question about reading the Bible without merely rehashing 51  Mai-Anh Le Tran, “Lot’s Wife, Ruth, and Tô Thị: Gender and Racial Representation in a Theological Feast of Stories,” in Foskett and Kuan, Ways of Being, Ways of Reading, 125. 52  This and the following quotes are from Gale A. Yee, “Yin/Yang Is Not Me: An Exploration into an Asian American Biblical Hermeneutics,” in Foskett and Kuan, Ways of Being, Ways of Reading, 156. 53  For publications from the North American context, see, e.g., Joseph A. Marchal, The Politics of Heaven: Women, Gender, and Empire in the Study of Paul (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2008); Hee An Choi and Katheryn Pfisterer Darr, eds., Engaging the Bible: Critical Readings from Contemporary Women (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2006); Vander Stichele and Penner, Her Master’s Tools? For publications from other contexts, see, e.g., Seong Hee Kim, Mark, Women and Empire: A Korean Postcolonial Perspective (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2010); Jean Kyoung Kim, Woman and Nation: An Intercontextual Reading of the Gospel of John from a Postcolonial/Feminist Perspective (Leiden: Brill, 2004); Musa W. Dube Shomanah, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of the Bible (St. Louis, KY: Chalice, 2000). See also Phyllis A. Bird, ed., Reading the Bible as Women: Perspectives from Africa, Asia, and Latin America (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997). 54  See, e.g., Dora Mbuwayesango and Susanne Scholz, “Dialogical Beginnings: A Conversation on the Future of Feminist Biblical Studies,” JFSR 25.2 (2009): 93–103. See also the ensuing nine responses on 103–43. For an integration of different voices into a single-voiced scholarly account, see, e.g., Barbara E. Reid, Taking Up the Cross: New Testament Interpretations through Latina and Feminist Eyes (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007).

xxxviii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction text-fetishized ways of interpretation. Obviously, the field, as it has emerged during the past five decades, is not a monolithic area of scholarship. Researchers do not proceed in lockstep relying on uniform epistemic parameters, hermeneutical certitudes, or exegetical approaches. The field is diverse, multivocal, and pluriverse with many different research agendas, publications, and teachings offered to variously located, religiously oriented, or secularized audiences interested in the academic study of the Bible. This anthology features four broadly defined conceptual frameworks to organize the current state of feminist Hebrew Bible scholarship. The fourfold framework of globalization, neoliberalism, (digital) media cultures, and intersectionality aims to move away from what Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza classifies as the antiquarian-historical, modernist epistemic paradigm.55 She urges feminist Bible scholars to participate in the necessary “double paradigm shift in the ethos of biblical studies.”56 This paradigm shift moves from “a positivist scientist, allegedly interest-free and value-neutral objectivist ethos of scholarship to a scientific feminist one on the one hand,” as it also moves from “an androcentric or better kyriocentric linguistically based cultural ethos to a critical feminist one on the other hand.”57 This reconceptualization of biblical studies as feminist biblical studies needs to take place so that the field will be equipped to handle the challenges of globalization, neoliberalism, (digital) media cultures, and intersectionality. By leaving the dominant positivist-scientific discourse behind, feminist biblical scholars will become equipped to counteract objectivist, disinterested, and purely technical research claimed to be based on quantitative methods or “data.” Schüssler Fiorenza proposes that “critical global feminist CT [Christian Testament] studies have to critically investigate the theoretical frameworks and scientific methods that we adopt from malestream biblical studies.”58 What she applies to “Christian Testament” studies surely applies to the Hebrew Bible, too. She also maintains that feminist Bible scholars “not only . . . scrutinize traditional methods and their frameworks as to their emancipatory or concealing functions but also articulate feminist critical approaches and methods.”59 She suggests to conceptualize “biblical studies as a rhetoric and ethics of inquiry and transformation,” which she classifies as “the emancipatory paradigm of biblical studies.”60 The fourfold framework of this anthology aims to implement her feminist-hermeneutical vision. 55  A prolific feminist Bible scholar over her fifty-five-year career, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza has published many books and articles. Her recent monographs explain the various exegetical-hermeneutical frameworks that have dominated biblical studies since the sixteenth century ce until today; see, e.g., Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Democratizing Biblical Studies: Toward an Emancipatory Educational Space (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009); The Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007). 56  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, “The Power of the Word: Charting Critical Global Feminist Biblical Studies,” in Feminist New Testament Studies: Global and Future Perspectives, ed., Kathleen O’Brien Wicker, Althea Spencer Miller, and Musa W. Dube (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 51. 57 Ibid. 58  Ibid., 53. 59  Ibid., 53–4. 60  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, “Changing the Paradigms: Toward a Feminist Future of the Biblical Past,” in The Future of the Biblical Past: Envisioning Biblical Studies on a Global Key, ed. Roland Boer and Fernando F. Segovia (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 301.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xxxix

Globalization The first part of the fourfold framework concentrates on the concept of globalization, certainly “a term that has, at best, a politically ambivalent charge.”61 The issue of globalization has become prominent in religious, theological, and biblical studies since the 1990s when politicians in Western countries began implementing economic policies that have expanded the manufacturing, financial, and technological industries far beyond Western countries to countries around the globe. The economist, Costas Lapavitsas, defines globalization as it has emerged since the 1990s as referring to “the growth of the world market, the expansion of international financial markets, the increasing interpenetration of economies via foreign direct investment, the rise of global flows of lending, and a host of related phenomena in the world market during the last three decades.”62 By now, a general discontent with globalization has set in, as the economist, Joseph E. Stiglitz, observes. He asserts that “[t]he discontent with globalization arises not just from economics seeming to be pushed over everything else, but because a particular view of economics—market fundamentalism—is pushed over all other views.”63 What we need, therefore, are “global public institution to help set the rules” according to local, regional, national, and global circumstances.64 The globalized outlook began to become part of biblical studies since the mid-1990s. Biblical scholars, Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert, brought it prominently to the attention of biblical exegesis when they published their two-volume work, Reading from This Place.65 They explain that the globalized perspective is needed in biblical studies because we are working in “a radically changing world within biblical criticism—a world of increasing and irreversible diversity and pluralism, the world of the twentyfirst century.”66 The significance of opening up biblical scholarship to a globalized hermeneutics has become established as part of the academic study of the Bible when the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) began publishing monographs and anthologies in a new series called “International Voices in Biblical Studies.”67 The series aims

61  So poignantly articulated by Elizabeth A. Castelli, “Globalization, Transnational Feminisms, and the Future of Biblical Critique,” in Feminist New Testament Studies: Global and Future Perspectives, ed. Kathleen O’Brien Wicker, Althea Spencer Miller, and Musa W. Dube (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 67. 62  Costas Lapavitsas, Profiting without Producing: How Finance Exploits Us All (London / New York, NY: Verso Books, 2013), 13. 63 Joseph E. Stiglitz, Globalization and Its Discontents Revisited: Anti-Globalization in the Era of Trump (New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 2018), 309. 64  Ibid., 311. 65  Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert, eds., “Preface,” in Reading from this Place (Vol. 1: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in the United States; Vol. 2: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective), ed. Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995). 66  Ibid., Vol. 2, xi. 67  For the growing list of titles, visit https://www.sbl-site.org/publications/Books_IVBS.aspx.

xl   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction “to  stimulate reflection on biblical hermeneutics on a global scale.”68 The growing number of books published in the series illustrate the diversity and range of approaches and views about globalization articulated within the globalized communities of biblical scholars. The focus on globalized locations of biblical research has thus proven to be a productive starting point within the field, including in feminist biblical studies. Here is where Vincent L. Wimbush’s pertinent objection to the mere assimilation into the existing scholarly status quo comes to mind, as he asks: “Why should the Bible, that master narrative text of Western culture, the text that has figured so prominently in providing ideological justification for the wresting of the land called new from native peoples, in providing warrants for securing it and building it up on the backs of the forced labor of Africans—how should we think about the Bible, and about continuing relationships with it? What might we do about the Europeanization of the Bible? And what about the overdetermined European-white North Americanist interpretive agenda and approaches in relationship to it?”69 He has an answer to his questions that goes like this: To be fully human is to interpret. To interpret is to seek meaning. The truly free individual is the one who seeks meaning through radical readings—open-ended readings about the self in the world, necessarily including the past, readings that represent openness to other ways of knowing, readings that expand the boundaries and genres of scripturalizing.70

The search is for meaning as found in readings, including biblical readings, from around the world. Such readings cannot be divorced from their social locations and contexts, and they must be freed from enslaved master narratives, hermeneutical scientism, and methodological restrictions, according to Wimbush. Thus, globalization ought not to be reduced to economics or politics, but, as some Nigerian scholars explain, the definition of globalization ought to underscore the notion of global “in­ter­de­pend­ence” and “international solidarity.”71 Practiced in the context of globalization, (feminist) biblical interpretation would then be “holistic, tolerant, accommodating, and . . . [offer] a congenial forum for the participation of both the developed and developing worlds.”72 Gold Okwuolise Anie explains further: It must be a globalization that democratizes its ideas and power; a globalization where no man [sic] is oppressed; no continent marginalized; no country trivialized 68  Knut Holter and Louis C. Jonker, “Introduction,” in Global Hermeneutics? Reflections and Consequences, ed. Knut Holter and Louis C. Jonker (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2010), vii. 69  Vincent L. Wimbush, “Signifying on Scriptures: An African Diaspora Proposal for Radical Readings,” in Feminist New Testament Studies: Global and Future Perspectives, ed., Kathleen O’Brien Wicker, Althea Spencer Miller, and Musa W. Dube (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 248. 70  Ibid., 256. 71  P. O. Abioje, “Biblical Response to Globalization: The Nigerian Context,” Ogbomoso Journal of Theology (December 10, 2005): 33. 72  Gold Okwuolise Anie, “Globalization and Demythologization in African Biblical Hermeneutics,” Ogbomoso Journal of Theology (December 10, 2005): 75.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xli and no theologian and Biblicist denied a pride of place in the ongoing theological evolution in Africa. This can only be made possible where there is “a dialectical interaction process in all aspects of human life involving all sectors of the globe” in Biblical Hermeneutics.73

What is true for Africa ought also to be true for America, Asia, Australia, and Europe. Roland Boer and Fernando F. Segovia argue that much when they state: “Since the late 1980s a good deal has changed, not least of which is the breakdown in the North Atlantic dominance of biblical scholarship or the severe downturn of those economies since 2008 and the seismic economic shift to Asia. Voices from the majority of the globe have begun and continue to speak in ways that are reshaping biblical studies. . . .”74 In our current era of “dense systems of communication,”75 then, the conceptual category of globalization offers considerable opportunities for feminist Hebrew Bible studies. In other words, the framework of globalization does not emphasize the world of money, economics, and finance as much as the global infrastructures of communication and connections among the vast numbers of Bible readers living around the world. The ten essays in the section entitled “The Impact of Globalization on Feminist Biblical Studies” elaborate on those opportunities within various contexts and in various ways.

Neoliberalism The second part of the fourfold framework concentrates on the concept of neoliberalism. This notion permeates contemporary intellectual discourse since 2008 although political, economic, and social policies, grounded in neoliberal convictions, have been implemented at least since the Reagan-Thatcher era of the early 1980s. According to Leo Panitch and Sam Gindin, the neoliberal ideology emerged already in continuity to the post-war era. The early to mid-twentieth-century economists, Ludwig on Mises and Friedrich Hayek, coined the term, although neoliberalist policies only took hold when Keynesian policies fell apart in the 1970s. After the election of the US-president, Ronald Reagan, and the British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, in the 1980s, neoliberal ideology became part of everyday life. It brought “massive tax cuts for the rich, the crushing of trade unions, deregulation, privatization, outsourcing and competition in public services.”76 Panitch and Gindin explain that “neoliberalism was essentially a political response to the democratic gains that had been previously achieved by working classes

73 Ibid. 74  Roland Boer and Fernando F. Segovia, eds., The Future of the Biblical Past: Envisioning Biblical Studies on a Global Key (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), xvi. 75  Sheila Briggs, “Response: Globalization, Transnational Feminisms, and the Future of Biblical Critique,” in Feminist New Testament Studies: Global and Future Perspectives, ed., Kathleen O’Brien Wicker, Althea Spencer Miller, and Musa W. Dube (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 82. 76 Ibid.

xlii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction and which had become, from capital’s perspective, barriers to accumulation.”77 In contrast to the neoliberal rhetoric, neoliberalism required the state as “the key actor” and its success did not signify “institutional retreat” but “the expansion and consolidation of the networks of institutional linkages to an already existing capitalism.”78 Nowadays, the “neoliberal system of class power and inequality”79 permeates every facet of society. The political scientist, Wendy Brown, observes that neoliberalism is “a peculiar form of reason that configures all aspects of existence in economic terms.”80 Political and “other heretofore noneconomic spheres and activities” are economized because “neoliberal reason . . . is converting the distinctly political character, meaning, and operation of democracy’s constituent elements into economic ones.”81 In short, neoliberalism turns politics into economics, and the question is always and only: Does this activity make money? If not, it becomes part of a series of “quaint concerns”82 that we cannot afford anymore. In the growing reliance on data analytics, the drive toward efficiency, marketability, and monetization increases the marginalization and elimination of any societal activity that does not reinforce the neoliberal agenda. For progressive thinkers, the neoliberal ideology is the root cause for many social and political problems around the globe.83 For instance, the British writer, George Monbiot, claims that neoliberalism “sees competition as the defining characteristic of human relations” and “redefines citizens as consumers, whose democratic choices are best exercised by buying and selling, a process that rewards merit and punishes inefficiency.” As the neoliberal position “maintains that ‘the market’ delivers benefits that could never be achieved by planning,”84 it forces workers and citizens alike to submit to the privatization of public services such as energy, water, trains, planes, health services, education, roads, and even prisons. Meanwhile, freedom has become the rallying cry of the neoliberal ideology. It wants freedom from regulation, freedom from any kind of collective responsibility and the common good, and freedom to do as one pleases without regard for anybody else. The “markets” are said to run supreme, solving any problem of society. Nobody articulates it better than the cultural critic, Henry A. Giroux, when he explains: [N]eoliberalism as a form of economic Darwinism attempts to undermine all forms of solidarity capable of challenging market-driven values and social relations, promoting the virtues of an unbridled individualism almost pathological in its disdain for community, social responsibility, public values, and the public good.85 77  Leo Panitch and Sam Gindin, The Making of Global Capitalism: The Political Economy of American Empire (London: Verso, 2012), 15. 78 Ibid. 79  Ibid., 338. 80  Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution (Brooklyn, NY: Zone Books, 2015), 17. 81 Ibid. 82  Ibid., 23. 83  See, e.g., George Monbiot, “Neoliberalism: The Ideology at the Root of All Our Problems,” The Guardian (April 15, 2016): https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideologyproblem-george-monbiot. 84 Ibid. 85 Henry A. Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2014), 2.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xliii On the educational and social levels, neoliberal ideology eliminates the conditions for critical inquiry, the value of moral responsibility, and the quest for social or economic justice. As the logic of neoliberalism requires “privatization, commodification, deregulation, militarization, hypermasculinity, and a ruthless ‘competitive struggle in which only the fittest could survive,’ ”86 authoritarian regimes of the corporate-driven state are transforming “[t]he democratic imagination . . . into a data machine that marshals its inhabitants into the neoliberal dreamworld of babbling consumers and armies of exploitative labor whose ultimate goal is to accumulate capital and initiate individuals into the brave new surveillance/punishing state that merges Orwell’s Big Brother with Huxley’s mind-altering soma.”87 One of the most dangerous results of these decades-old developments are the ensuing political crises. The sociologist, Charles Derber, published an entire book on ten strategies for alternative grassroots mobilization in opposition to the neoliberal condition that threatens to turn into “the specter of fascism.”88 In his view, all of us have to become  part of a “universal resistance for social justice, equal rights, and democracy” to uphold common values, such as “a concern for others, a desire to help those in need, a belief in justice, a lack of faith in the ‘Establishment’ and the rich people in power, and a desire to make a difference.”89 He advises that this resistance must be based on “a new universalizing approach”90 that the feminist writer, Audre Lorde, envisioned when she observed: “There is no thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live ­single-issue lives.”91 Accordingly, Derber advises to develop resistance to the ten systemic ways in which neoliberal ideology is spreading. He lists them in the following way: 1. Universalizing Extreme Inequality 2. Universalizing Global Control 3. Universalizing the Corporation and Corporate Power 4. Universalizing Authoritarianism, Militarism, Surveillance, and Repression 5. Universalizing Ideological Control 6. Universalizing Western Ways of Knowing 7. Universalizing Trans-Species Violence and Destruction to Nature 8. Universalizing “Kochamamie” Corporatized Democracy 9. Universalizing Existential Threats to All Life 10. Universalizing the Death Culture.92

86  Ibid., 16. 87 Henry A. Giroux, Dangerous Thinking in the Age of the New Authoritarianism (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2015), 12. 88  Charles Derber, Welcome to the Revolution: Universalizing Resistance for Social Justice and Democracy in Perilous Times (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 2017), 3. 89  Ibid., xxiii. 90  Ibid., 3. 91  Audre Lorde, Quotes—Goodreads, https://www.goodreads.com/author /quotes/18486.Audre_Lorde. 92 Derber, Welcome to the Revolution, 2.

xliv   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction To counteract these ten neoliberal principles, Derber comes up with strategies of resistance. He calls them “ten new ‘rules of the road’ ” that nurture movements of re­sist­ ance to the “universalized system power with new unifying forms of popular power.”93 Here are the ten new rules of resistance to neoliberal power:

1. Fight the Power, A.K.A. the System 2. Win the Majority 3. Converge! 4. Democratize the World 5. Protect Mother Earth 6. Say Yes to Alternatives 7. Create Media of, by, and for the People 8. Let’s Get Political 9. Think, Learn, and Teach 10. Choose Live and Love.94

Detailed explanations for each rule appear in Derber’s 315-page book. What becomes clear is the need for feminist biblical scholarship to take seriously the impact of neoliberal ideology on biblical studies and to join the universalizing resistance movement. The six essays in this Handbook’s section entitled “The Impact of Neoliberalism on Feminist Biblical Interpretation” illustrate the stony but indispensable path ahead.

(Digital) Media Cultures The third part of the fourfold framework focuses on the concept of (digital) media cultures. They include both analog and digital media, hence the parenthesis for the adjective “digital.” Analog cultures have, of course, been around for a long time, including as commentaries on the Bible. The visual arts, fiction writing and poetry, and music are all part of the cultural artifacts of past and present Bible reading societies. Digital technologies have existed since the twentieth century, but they have gained attention from biblical scholars only during the past few decades. How both analog and digital technologies have shaped the various media cultures is of growing interest to feminist Bible scholars. In general, the academic field of biblical studies, as it has emerged during the modern era since the sixteenth century ce, has investigated (digital) media cultures as a research area only hesitatingly since the late 1990s. As a text-oriented, historically defined endeavor, biblical research was defined apart from cultural appropriations of the Bible. Central to the field’s academic status has been the quest for historical origins, which precluded the systematic and detailed analysis of the Bible’s impact on popular cultures. The focus on historical origins has dominated biblical studies since the emergence of modernity despite the countless artistic appropriations of biblical texts, characters, or 93  Ibid., 5.

94 Ibid.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xlv topics in the realm of art, for instance. For several centuries, Bible critics considered such appropriations as being outside the scholarly realm of the field of biblical studies. This mindset only changed when some feminist and non-feminist Bible scholars became interested in (digital) media cultures as worthy research topics, publishing their works with increasing frequency. These scholars followed cultural-studies researchers in general, investigating the socio-political forces in society since the 1950s or 1960s, when British scholars began investigating working-class issues as part of their research on the relationship between everyday cultural expressions and the political economy. The founding of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) at the University of Birmingham by Richard Hoggart in 1964, later run by his assistant Stuart Hall, is usually mentioned as the official starting point for the emergence of cultural studies as an academic field. The origins of cultural studies thus lie in left-leaning scholarship on the interplay between culture and politics. Thus, a Marxist and neo-Gramscian trajectory originally shaped the scholarly discourse. The founding generation of cultural criticism has also posited that popular culture be part of analyzing the power differentials in society, as popular culture creates consent of working people to class stratified society. In  other words, cultural critics have originally exposed popular culture as a “soft” expression of stratified society that allows the ruling class to forego on brute force and violence, if possible. The field of cultural studies embraces a wide spectrum of academic disciplines as it is inherently interdisciplinary, multi-perspectival, and methodologically variable. Among the academic disciplines are sociology, anthropology, philosophy, political science, ­literary studies, computer studies, media and communication studies, international studies, and religious studies. Many anthologies have been published in the past few decades, covering the wide spectrum of theories and topics of cultural-studies research. A widely read publication is the anthology, entitled The Cultural Studies Reader that Simon During edited.95 The volume consists of eight sections. The first section, entitled “Theory and method,” includes essays by Stuart Hall, Antonio Gramsci, Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, Pierre Bourdieu, all distinguished theorists of cultural studies, and three lesser-known critics. The second section, entitled “Culture in space,” presents essays by Henri Lefebvre, Michel Foucault, and Gille Deleuze who discuss the power of space and politics. The remaining six sections are “Globalization/postmodernism,” “Nationalism/postcolonialism/multiculturalism,” “Science, nature and cyberculture,” “Sexuality and gender,” “Consumption and the market,” and “Media and public spheres.” Notoriously, none of the essays include references to religion, although so many people around the globe practice their religions every day. Two observations emerge in light of this volume’s organizational structure. First, the conceptual structure privileges Western male theorists. Second, gender and sexuality are relegated into one particular section whereas (digital) technology, media, and art appear throughout various sections. This

95  Simon During, ed., The Cultural Studies Reader (third ed.; Abingdon / New York, NY: Routledge, 2007). The first edition was published in 1997.

xlvi   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction bias remains untheorized so far. Yet the bias also suggests that digital media cultures has gained increasing visibility in popular culture. Yet another issue about contemporary cultural-studies research deserves mention. Sometimes such research lacks the theoretical and political edge of earlier cultural-studies scholarship. For instance, the comprehensive textbook, Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice, written by Chris Barker and Emma A. Jane,96 bristles with numerous opportunities to elaborate on the intersections of culture and power, hegemony and structures of domination. Yet the issue-oriented reviews on the various cultural topics present many sections and subsections with little attention to these intersections. The volume even culminates in a discussion on “Neo-pragmatism and cultural studies,” centering on U.S.-American philosopher Richard Rorty’s “politics without foundation,”97 as if to suggest that cultural critics do not favor particular political perspectives. On the positive side, the volume includes extensive surveys on the cultural impact of television, social media, and digital media, all of which touch on the “cultural politics” of the internet and related digital data cultures.98 Still, these sections do not address issues of race, ethnicity, gender, or theoretical concerns. That the textbook’s authors do not include any references to religion in today’s world is another remarkable omission that is, however, characteristic of contemporary academic discourse. Despite the negligence of religion in the field of cultural studies, the impact of cultural studies on the academic study of the Bible has been substantial. It is obvious why this would be so. Part of two highly influential religious traditions, Judaism and Christianity, and foundational to another hugely popular religious tradition, Islam, the Bible shows up everywhere in the world. Hence, biblical research in the visual arts, film, literature, music, architecture, or various exegetical and theological interpretation histories is a flourishing research area in biblical studies today.99 One of the first anthologies on 96  Chris Barker and Emma A. Jane, Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice (fifth ed.; London: SAGE, 2016). 97  Ibid., 625–31, esp. 626–28. 98  Ibid., 400–56, 457–512. 99  See, e.g., Richard G. Walsh, ed., T&T Clark Companion to the Bible and Film (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018); Bradford A. Anderson and Jonathan F. Kearney, eds., Ireland and the Reception of the Bible: Social and Cultural Perspectives (London / New York, NY: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018); Caroline Blyth and Nasili Vaka’uta, eds., The Bible and Art: Perspectives from Oceania (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017); Colleen M. Conway, Sex and Slaughter in the Tent of Jael: A Cultural History of a Biblical Story (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017); Philip Goff, Arthur E. Farnsley, and Peter J. Thuesen, eds., The Bible in American Life (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017); Laura Copier and Caroline Vander Stichele, eds., Close Encounters between Bible and Film: An Interdisciplinary Encounter (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016); Rhonda BurnetteBletsch, ed., The Bible in Motion: A Handbook of the Bible and Its Reception in Film (2 vols.; Berlin / Boston, MA: Walter de Gruyter, 2016); Melissa C. Stewart, ed., Simulating Aichele: Essays in Bible, Film, Culture and Theory (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2015); Adele Reinhartz, ed., Bible and Cinema: An Introduction (London: Routledge, 2013); Pantelis Michelakis and Maria Wyke, The Ancient World in Silent Cinema (Cambridge / New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2013); Max Stern, Bible & Music: Influences of the Old Testament on Western Music (Jersey City, NJ: KTAV Publishing House, 2011); Elaine Mary Wainwright and Philip Leroy, eds., The Bible in/and Popular Culture: A Creative Encounter (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2010); Beth Hawkins Benedix, ed., Subverting Scriptures: Critical Reflections on the Use of the Bible (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009); David Shepherd, ed.,

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xlvii cultural biblical studies was edited by J. Cheryl Exum and Stephen D. Moore in 1998. Entitled Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies, the book resulted from an international colloquium at the University of Sheffield in April 1997.100 The volume’s editors explain that “the practice of cultural studies offers critical tools for analyzing the Bible’s position of privilege in the Western canon and provides a theoretical perspective from which to look not only at the production of meaning in the past but also at ways the Bible and contemporary culture mutually influence each other.”101 The nineteen essays of the book examine the intersections of biblical and cultural studies with various discussions of the Bible as a cultural object, the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim interpretation history of Genesis 39 in paintings, drawings, or illustrations, and the depiction of Jesus in Monty Python’s Life of Bryon. Interestingly, considerations on the theory and practice of cultural scholarship in biblical studies are largely absent. Individual case studies on various and highly selective topics on the appearance of the Bible in culture dominate the book. The reticence of biblical scholars to engage in meta-level discussions on the cultural study of the Bible is also prevalent in another volume. Entitled The Blackwell Companion to the Bible and Culture and published in 2012, this volume illustrates the tendency to interrogate the Bible within specific past and present cultures, relatively independent of theoretical, methodological, or socio-political considerations. Edited by John F. A. Sawyer, the volume consists of four sections. The first section offers a linear chronology of Bible readings from ancient Near Eastern times to the “Modern World.” The second section includes essays on significant geographical and religious appropriations of the Bible around the globe. The third section covers aesthetic and performative renderings of the Bible, such as in literature, film, music, or the visual arts. The fourth section presents essays about the Bible as it is read in areas such as politics, psychology, or post-colonialism. In short, the study of the Bible in culture turns into an extensive, diligent, and informative rehearsal of the abundant ways in which cultural interpretations have appropriated the Bible.102 The focus is on the afterlife of the Bible. A vibrant and colorful mosaic Images of the Word: Hollywood’s Bible and Beyond (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2008); J. Cheryl Exum, ed., Retellings: The Bible in Literature, Music, Art and Film (Leiden: Brill, 2007); J. Cheryl Exum and Ela Nutu, eds., Between the Text and the Canvas: The Bible and Art in Dialogue (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007); Mark Roncace and Patrick Gray, eds., Teaching the Bible through Popular Culture and the Arts (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2007); Martin O’Kane, Painting the Text: The Artist as Biblical Interpreter (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007); Eric S. Christianson, Ecclesiastes through the Centuries (Malden, MA / Oxford: Blackwell Publisher, 2007); J. Cheryl Exum, ed., The Bible in Film—the Bible and Film (Leiden: Brill, 2006); George Aichele, ed., Culture, Entertainment and the Bible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000); Vincent L. Wimbush, ed., African Americans and the Bible: Sacred Texts and Social Textures (New York, NY: Continuum, 2000); Theophus Harold Smith, Conjuring Culture: Biblical Formations of Black America (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1994). 100  J. Cheryl Exum and Stephen D. Moore, eds., Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998). 101  Ibid., 19. 102  See, e.g., Claudia Setzer and David A. Shefferman, eds., The Bible and American Culture: A Sourcebook (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2011); Martin O’Kane, Bible Art Gallery (The Bible in

xlviii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction of cultural biblical interpretations has thus emerged in the academic study of the Bible. The ten essays of this Handbook’s third section, “(Digital) Media Cultures,” illustrate the enduring scholarly energy and creativity in cultural biblical scholarship with feminist and gender issues in mind.

Intersectionality The fourth part of the fourfold framework investigates the concept of intersectionality. Perhaps no other analytical concept has gained public prominence and theoretical acceptance like the notion of intersectionality. Originally coined by the U.S.-American legal scholar, Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, the concept refers to the analytical insight that the various structures of domination related to gender and sexuality always intersect with other sociopolitical categories, such as race, ethnicity, class, geopolitical location, nationality, age, religion, or able-bodiedness. All of these categories form interlocking systems of power that feminist theorists need to consider simultaneously in their studies of discriminatory practices in the world. Crenshaw articulated the concept of intersectionality in 1989 when she explained that traditional feminist ideas and antiracist policies exclude the particular sociopolitical circumstances of black women in the U.S.A., as they face overlapping discrimination of gender and race. Crenshaw observed: “Because the intersectional experience is greater than the sum of racism and sexism, any analysis that does not take intersectionality into account cannot sufficiently address the particular manner in which Black women are subordinated.”103 Other feminist theorists, such as Jewish feminists, socialist feminists, lesbian feminists, or postcolonial feminists, also asserted the link between gender and other social categories, but the theoretical clarity of Crenshaw’s essay challenging the exclusive focus on gender as the sole category for feminist theorizing had a powerful impact. It ensured that feminists recognize the ongoing significance of white-supremacist and patriarchal strategies of “divide and conquer” in the United States and the need of feminist analysis to consider the interlocking systems of oppression. The concept of intersectionality has also been gladly employed internationally, empowering feminist thinkers and activists alike to make connections among the broad spectrum of unjust and oppressive sociopolitical, economic, religious, and global infrastructures as they relate to gender and sexuality. The concept has given feminist ­theorists and activists the vocabulary to build broad-based coalitions toward the goal of gender justice, equality, and peace. In addition, the notion of intersectionality has the Modern World 21; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011); J. Cheryl Exum, Plotted, Shot, and Painted: Cultural Representations of Biblical Women (Gender, Culture, Theory 3; JSOT Sup Series 215; Sheffield: Sheffield Press, 1996); 103  Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics,” The University of Chicago Legal Form (1989): 140; available at: http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf/ vol1989/iss1/8.

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   xlix alerted progressive feminists to the dangers of the white liberal feminist slide into essentializing discourse on the gender binary, as it has been conventionally defined in many cultures and is urgently defended among religious fundamentalists today. Feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible have also benefited from the conviction that the analysis of gender and sexuality needs to be based on an intersectional analysis. Although scholarly articles and books continue to be published that advance naturalized views about “women” in the Bible, thus disregarding the hermeneutical insights on the sociopolitical limitations and even dangers of essentialized gender discourse, the employment of intersectional feminist principles in biblical interpretation demonstrates the ongoing need to denaturalize biblical women and gender at all times. L. Juliana Claassens and Carolyn J. Sharp edited a volume that explores the intersectional connections within variously defined feminist frameworks.104 According to the editors, their volume represents “a good example of new interpretive perspectives that might emerge by bringing divergent texts and context together.” The thirteen contributions thus foster “a whole new line of inquiry regarding biblical text”105 and open up “interpretive traditions to emancipatory visions of community” by “celebrat[ing] intersectionality, interrogat[ing] power, and embrac[ing] ambiguity.”106 Importantly, the anthology affirms that feminist biblical interpreters cannot focus only on biblical women since essentializing discourse on gender and sexuality belongs to a bygone era. All contributors affirm that feminist biblical exegesis must be grounded in intersectional understandings of gender and sexuality. For instance, Claassen explains succinctly: “This idea of multiple, intersecting reading lenses resonates with my own work as is also evident in my contribution to this particular volume in which I explored gender, postcolonial, queer, and trauma perspectives on the metaphor of a woman in labor that is used throughout the book of Jeremiah.”107 Similar research exists in feminist and womanist biblical works, taking seriously the intersectionalities of gender and sexuality in their readings of the Bible.108 The eleven essays included in the present 104  L. Juliana Claassens and Carolyn J. Sharp, eds., Feminist Frameworks and the Bible: Power, Ambiguity, and Intersectionality (Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Studies 630; London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017). 105  Ibid., 3. 106  Ibid., 7. 107  Ibid., 21. 108  See, e.g., Gale A. Yee, ed., The Hebrew Bible: Feminist and Intersectional Perspectives (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2018); Mitzi J. Smith, Womanist Sass and Talk Back: Social (In) justice, Intersectionality, and Biblical Interpretation (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2018); Simone Sinn, Dina El Omari, and Anne Hege Grung, eds., Transformative Readings of Sacred Scriptures: Christians and Muslims in Dialogue (Leipzig / Geneva, Switzerland: Evangelische Verlangsanstalt / The Lutheran World Federation, 2017); Susanne Scholz, The Bible as Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2017); Nele Spiering-Schomborg, Rita Burrichter, Bernhard Grümme et al., ‘Man kann sich nicht entscheiden, als was man geboren wird’: Exodus 1 im Horizont von Intersektionalität und empirischer Bibeldidaktik (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer Verlag, 2017); Gay L. Byron and Vanessa Lovelace, eds., Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016); Randall C. Bailey and Tat-siong Benny Liew, eds., They Were All Together in One Place: Toward Minority Biblical Criticism (Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill, 2009); Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Democratizing Biblical Studies: Toward an Emancipatory Educational Space (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009).

l   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction Handbook illustrate the wide spectrum of feminist intersectional analysis in Hebrew Bible studies, ranging from historical to queer, transgender, egalitarian-evangelical, animal, ecological, interfaith, and cross-religious studies of biblical texts, characters, and topics. In sum, the four broadly defined conceptual frameworks of globalization, neoliberalism, (digital) media cultures, and intersectionality reconceptualize the feminist study of the Hebrew Bible. They move it from the antiquarian-historical, modernist epistemic paradigm to the emancipatory, democratizing paradigm, thereby equipping feminist exegetes to investigate biblical texts and their variously defined and located interpretation histories as part of the rhetoric and ethics of feminist inquiry and transformation.

Why Feminist Hebrew Bible Studies Matters in a World Threatened by Ecological Devastation, Technofascist Domination, Hegemonic Economic Exploitation of Billions of People, and the Rise of Ethno-Religious Nationalist Fundamentalism Much has changed since feminist scholars began interpreting the Hebrew Bible during the aftermath of the U.S.-American Civil Rights Movement, the global emergence of the ecological movement, the successful dismantling of the Western colonial empire, the rise of computer technologies, and the financialization of capitalist societies worldwide. The loud and systematic dismantling of patriarchal, androcentric, and heteronormative hegemonies, within their intersectional manifestations, has been on the forefront of feminist theory and practice ever since. Deeply ingrained sexism, misogyny, heteronormativity, and homophobia in academic and religious institutions have not been particularly accommodating to feminist demands for sociopolitical, cultural, economic, intellectual, or religious change and transformation. On the contrary. The relentless move toward neoliberal, technocratic, and corporatedriven shifts that are accompanied by religious and secular fundamentalism globally need to be recognized as hegemonic power moves. They disable requests for emancipation, democracy, and justice. The academic field of biblical studies serves as a showcase for the tremendous powers involved that uphold the status quo wherever it is questioned. Feminist biblical scholars, working at the beginning of the twenty-first century, have thus to consider the changed global circumstances pertaining to the academic study of the Bible. All of the academic and religious institutions in which scholarly investigations of the Bible enjoyed financial, cultural, intellectual, and theological

Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction   li support experience considerable pressure to survive the sociopolitical, economic, cultural, and religious changes under way. A major component of these changes has to do with the fact that the market economics extends to “a series of hitherto ‘noneconomic’ realms” because “economics has become the default setting for understanding virtually everything in our world.”109 With the emergence of “fiat money” since the collapse of the Bretton Woods system in 1971–73, the cultural logic of value has become free floating and radically open. As Teresa  J.  Hornsby observes so poignantly: “If sexuality and gender are constructed in collusion with capitalistic power, a shift in capitalism should create different sexual and gender normatives.”110 Since “new postmodern capitalism requires submissive subjects, . . . we as postmodern biblical scholars are doing our part to produce them.”111 How then shall feminist scholars read the Hebrew Bible at this “new historical conjuncture in which political rule has been replaced by corporate sovereignty, consumerism becomes the only obligation of citizenship, and the only value that matters is exchange value”?112 It seems to get clearer and clearer by the day that the postpostmodern era is about authoritarian regimes of power. Under such conditions, how ought feminist Bible scholars interpret biblical texts so that they do not teach complicity “with authoritarian practices”?113 And most importantly, how can feminist biblical interpreters challenge authoritarian practices “and under what circumstances”?114 As Henry A. Giroux insists again and again, “[t]he situation is dire when people seem no longer interested in contesting such power.”115 In the age of “manufactured stupidity,” the suppression of “critical thinking, dissent, and organized resistance,” the “embrace of anti-Enlightenment ideologies, the rise of a poisonous religious fundamentalism, and the emergence of a culture of conformity” in the Western world and beyond,116 the task of feminist biblical studies is obvious. It must dismantle the dangers of biblical literalism, counter the omnipresent binaries of us versus them, female and male, or the common good against private property.117 It needs to nurture empathetic thought and practice to develop a readerly sense of justice, integrity, and peace beyond the binaries of naturalized, essentialized views about the gendered and sexualized texts and the world in which these texts are read. It must make conscious unconsciously held assumptions on gender and sexuality in their intersectional dimensions, bring minoritized and marginalized voices to the table, connect with different religious and intellectual traditions, recover and implement alternative reading 109 Jeffrey T. Nealon, Post-Postmondernism or, the Cultural Logic of Just-in-Time Capitalism (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012), 180. 110  Teresa J. Hornsby, “Capitalism, Masochism, and Biblical Interpretation,” in Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship, ed. Teresa J. Hornsby and Ken Stone (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2011), 137. 111  Ibid., 153. 112 Giroux, Dangerous Thinking, 11. 113  Ibid., 10. 114 Ibid. 115  Ibid., 12. 116  Ibid., 19. 117  The insistence on the gender binaries is ongoing and relentless; see, e.g., Congregation for Catholic Education, “ ‘Male and Female He Created Them’: Towards a Path of Dialogue on the Question of Gender Theory in Education” (Rome: Vatican City, 2019). Available at: http://www .educatio.va/content/dam/cec/Documenti/19_0997_INGLESE.pdf.

lii   Reading the Hebrew Bible with Feminist Eyes: Introduction possibilities, and deconstruct (neo-)colonizing methodologies about the biblical past and present. Since billions of humans across planet Earth read the Bible even today, the feminist task of dismantling authoritarian regimes of power that insist on patriarchal, androcentric, and heteronormative structures of domination is urgent. This Handbook on Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible contributes to this urgent task. It offers a vision for feminist biblical scholarship beyond the hegemonic status quo prevalent in the field of biblical studies, in many religious organizations and institutions that claim the Bible as a sacred text, and among the public that often mentions the Bible to establish religious, political, and socio-cultural restrictions for gendered practices. That such boundary making is still acceptable, considered normative, and viewed with approval even from dissenters illustrates that feminist biblical scholars have a long road to travel until the Bible will finally be read as a liberatory text and societies will be freed from discriminatory and unjust practices related to gender and sexuality. The task of feminist biblical scholars thus continues to be the interpretation of the Bible in conversation with and in the context of the relentless and manifold issues and practices that keep the gender caste system in place even in the early part of the twenty-first century. The essays of this volume offer conceptual and exegetical ways forward.

Pa rt I

T H E I M PAC T OF GL OBA L I Z AT ION ON F E M I N IST BI BL IC A L ST U DI E S

chapter 1

Biblica l I n ter pr etation a n d K y r i a rch a l Gl oba liz ation Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza

In Why Stories Matter: The Political Grammar of Feminist Theory, Clare Hemmings reminds us that it matters how we tell our stories1 and histories.2 In this essay I tell the story of feminist biblical studies in political terms as the story of a critical feminist analytics of domination. By this I mean the analysis of the inscription of kyriarchy in the biblical artifact that has been developed by feminist studies in general and by feminist studies of the Bible in particular.3 The variegated contributions in the hefty volume The Bible and Feminism, edited by Yvonne Sherwood, tell this story with a focus on the diversity of approaches and frameworks; in my edited volumes, entitled Searching the Scriptures,4 I tell it in political terms. The two volumes of Searching the Scriptures 1  Clare Hemmings, Why Stories Matter: The Political Grammar of Feminist Theory (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011). 2  See also Ann Oakley, Sex, Gender, and Society (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1972); Rosemary Radford Ruether, “Patriarchy,” in Lisa Isherwood and Dorothea McEwan, eds., An A to Z of Feminist Theology (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996), 173–4; Sylvia Walby, Theorizing Patriarchy (Oxford: Basil, 1990); Ernst Bornemann, Das Patriarchat—Ursprung und Zukunft unseres Gesellschaftssystems (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1991); Maria Mies, Patriarchy and Accumulation on a World Scale: Women in the International Division of Labour (New York, NY: Palgrave, 1999); Lorraine Code, “Patriarchy,” in Lorraine Code, ed., Encyclopedia of Feminist Theories (London: Routledge, 2000), 378–9; Pierre Bourdieu, Masculine Domination (trans. Richard Nice; Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2001). 3  By feminist interpretation I mean a critical feminist interpretation for liberation. I elaborate on this understanding in “Feminist Theology as a Critical Theology of Liberation,” Theological Studies 36.4 (1975): 605–26 which was reprinted in Woman: New Dimensions, ed. Walter Burghardt (New York, NY: Paulist Press, 1977), 29–50; Mission Trends 4 (1979): 188–216; Churches in Struggle: Liberation Theologies and Social Change in North America, ed. William K. Tabb, 46–66 (New York, NY: Monthly Review Press, 1986). 4  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed., Searching the Scriptures (2 Vols.; New York, NY: Crossroad, 1993, 1994). Yvonne Sherwood, ed. The Bible and Feminism: Remapping the Field (New York: Oxford, 2018).

4   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza celebrate not only the centennial anniversary of the Woman’s Bible, edited by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, but also the radical democratic religious vision5 of Anna Julia Cooper,6 as the twin roots of feminist biblical studies.7 While the work of Cady Stanton is diminished by its focus on Anglo-Saxon elite wo/men or “Ladies,” Cooper’s work spells out a vision of solidarity and commitment “to make right every wrong”: It is not the intelligent woman vs. the ignorant woman, nor the white woman vs. the black, the brown and the red, it is not even the cause of woman vs. man. Nay, it is woman’s strongest vindication for speaking that the world needs to hear her voice. . . . Hers is every interest that has lacked an interpreter and a defender. Her cause is linked with that of every agony that has been dumb—every wrong that needs a voice.8

In her recent book, The Bible as Political Artifact, Susanne Scholz argues that the feminist study of the Bible necessitates reading Scripture as a political artifact.9 The Bible, read as a political artifact, she argues, “always indicates why things are ordered the way they are or, alternatively, how they could be ordered so that justice, peace, and the integrity of creation would prevail . . . .”10 For the theoretical explication of “artifact” Scholz refers to Langdon Winner, whose essay, “Do Artifacts Have Politics?,”11 explains that artifacts embody social relations and distribute and enhance power, authority, and privilege

5  See Karen Baker-Fletcher, A Singing Something: Womanist Reflections on Anna Julia Cooper (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1994). 6  See my book Sharing Her Word: Feminist Biblical Interpretation in Context (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1998), 50–74. 7  The Woman’s Caucus Religious Studies recovered the Woman’s Bible; see Judith Plaskow and Jean Arnold Romero, eds., Women and Religion (rev. ed.; Missoula, MT: Working Group on Women and Religion and Scholars Press, 1984). The black feminist political context of this work of women in religion is expressed by the Combahee River Collective. See Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2017) celebrating the Black Feminism of the Combahee River Collective and their manifesto published in 1977. Hence, it is more than surprising to read the following statement in the introduction of Gay L. Byron and Vanessa Lovelace, eds., Womanist Interpretation of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016), 8: “[W]omanism and black feminism are not interchangeable . . . . They ‘favor’ each other . . . but in contrast to womanism, feminism is still generally regarded as the ‘universal’ experience of white women.” This statement rejects the radical tradition of political black feminism that is not only aware of race and gender but also of class and imperialism. In this time of Trumpian racism and xenophobia, it is important to discuss the political roots and implications of our work. 8  Anna Julia Cooper, A Voice from the South (1892); republished in The Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century Black Women Writers (New York, NY; Oxford University Press, 1988), 122. 9  Susanne Scholz, The Bible as a Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2017). 10  Ibid., xv–xvi. For details on these theological principles, see, e.g., D. Preman Niles, “Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation,” WCC Ecumenical Dictionary (November 2003); available at http://www. wcc-coe.org/wcc/who/dictionary-article11.html. See also his monograph entitled Between the Flood and the Rainbow: Interpreting the Conciliar Process of Mutual Commitment (Covenant) to Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation (Geneva, WI: WCC Publications, 1992). 11  Langdon Winner, “Do Artifacts Have Politics?,” Daedalus 109.1 (Winter 1980): 121–36.

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   5 “of some over others.”12 To Winner, artifacts are tools that are not neutral, apolitical entities. Rather, they “build order in our world,”13 “structure decisions ,” and “establish a framework for public order that will endure over many generations.”14 In this sense, then, artifacts “correlate with particular kinds of political relationships,” and so they are “inherently political.”15 I agree with Scholz that Winner’s thesis sheds light on the conceptualization of the Bible as a “political artifact, a human-made construct that has been intimately immersed in, related to, and shaped by those societies in which biblical texts have been read, painted, filmed, talked about, shared, or even rejected.”16 However, I would add, biblical texts have not only been read and critically interpreted, but they also have been proclaimed, meditated on, and internalized as divine word. Understanding the Bible as a political artifact helps us to analyze not only the Bible’s historical content and literary form but also its religious-sacred power. It demands that we investigate how the Bible has shaped the social, economic, political, and religious order. It especially challenges biblical scholars to pay attention to the religious-ethical rhetoric and politics of the Bible. Therefore it is a particularly useful analytic concept for understanding the work that feminist biblical studies does. To tell the feminist story of the Bible as a political-religious artifact, I argue, needs to be told today in the context of neoliberal globalization, since the fundamentalist use of the Bible has legitimized the politics of neoliberal globalization. However, it was not feminism, as some argue, but the Western dualistic essentialized “masculine-feminine” gender framework understood not just as gender dualism but also gender hierarchy that has yoked segments of the women’s movement to neoliberal globalization.17 This framework “equalizes” or rather reduces the economic status of working class men to that of working class, single mothers, and poor wo/men, who could never rely on a “family wage.” It was not the feminist campaign for equal pay and work conditions, as some have argued, but the political ideology of neoliberalism that brought about this change. Hence, it is important to tell the story of feminist theory, history, and the*logy with respect to neoliberalism. For whatever stories about the feminist past we tell will shape not only our visions for its future, but also how we read the biblical artifact.

The Story of Feminist Biblical Studies (Part 1): Feminist Studies in Religion Feminist studies in general and feminist biblical studies in particular emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s,18 naming the oppressive powers at work in our world as pa­tri­archy, which literally means “the rule of the father of the household” but was generally 12  Ibid., 125. 13  Ibid., 127. 14  Ibid., 128. 15  Ibid., 123. 16 Scholz, The Bible as a Political Artifact, xx. 17  See my book Congress of Wo/men: Religion, Gender and Kyriarchal Power (Cambridge, MA: FSR Books, 2017). 18  A first attempt of telling the story of feminist biblical studies in the twentieth century has been made by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed., Feminist Biblical Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014).

6   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza understood as the domination of men over wo/men.19 However, this key category of feminist analysis was replaced by that of gender in the 1980s.20 In distinction to the categories of patriarchy and androcentrism the category of gender no longer articulates intersectional21 relations of domination. Whereas intersections of race, gender, class, colonialism, and other structures of oppression determine wo/men’s lives, the category of gender articulates only one of these dehumanizations and it does not articulate their systemic interstructuredness. By replacing the central analytic feminist categories of patriarchy and androcentrism (male-centered ideology) with gender, the question of power relations has been muted and is often eclipsed. The history of gender studies is not just a story important for feminism in the West but it is a story with global dimensions. It is important to note that gender studies arrived on the scene at the same time as neoliberal economic globalization and its academic discourses gained power and visibility around the world. The service industry of neoliberal globalization has not only exploited wo/men around the globe, but also reduced the economic power of working and middle class white men to that of working class and racialized wo/men, while at the same time promoting an ethos of aggressive masculinity. In the 1970s, women’s studies introduced the distinction between social gender roles and biological sex. By the mid-1980s, gender studies emerged alongside women’s studies as a distinct field of inquiry. Its theory questions seemingly universal beliefs about wo/men and men and attempts to unmask the cultural, societal, and political roots of gender. It must not be overlooked that women’s studies scholars first objected to the introduction of this analytic category because it no longer articulated that wo/men as historical agents were the focal point of feminist analysis. Thus, the transition from women’s studies to gender studies is, according to Hemmings, “more likely institutionally supported where it is harnessed to globalization and seen as producing future gender mainstreaming or gender and development experts.”22 In short, it is important to see that it was not feminism but the Western dualistic “masculinefeminine” framework of gender that has harnessed women’s studies, including biblical women studies, to neoliberal globalization. Moreover, gender has become a key analytic category alongside race, class, age, colonialism, and other identity markers, a

19  I write wo/men in this broken fashion in order to make visible that persons marked as “wo/men” do not have an essence in common and are extremely diverse. Additionally, I speak of wo/men in order to combat gendered language that uses men but not wo/men as an inclusive generic marker, as well as to indicate that the status of wo/men also defines that of subordinated and exploited men in neoliberal times. 20  See Mary Holmes, What is Gender? Sociological Approaches (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2007), and also my book entitled Jesus, Miriam’s Child, Sophia’s Prophet: Critical Issues in Feminist Christology (New York, NY: Continuum, 1995), 34–42. 21  Patricia Hill Collins and Sirma Bilge, Intersectionality (Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2016). 22 Hemmings, Why Stories Matter, 10–11.

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   7 development that has led to an “adding up of oppressions,”23 working alongside each other and constituting different dualistic frameworks of analysis. Finally, a feminist dualistic gender analytic has constituted the notion of diversity as an aggregate of such dualistic identity markers. Insofar as feminist theory has revealed the gender encoding of all knowledge, feminist studies in religion have been able to show the gendering of religious knowledge and religious institutions as well as to problematize the second-class status of wo/men in most religions. However, while in my understanding, feminist studies in religion engage both wo/men and gender studies for their work, feminist studies are not identical with and cannot be limited to them. Rather, both feminist political theory and feminist biblical studies have to focus not merely on gender and wo/men but on issues of power and structures of domination, that is on the politics of kyriarchal power.24

The Story of Feminist Biblical Studies (Part 2): Feminist Biblical Studies In line with Latin American liberation the*logy and German political the*logy of the 1970s as well as critical feminist theories of liberation in the past five decades, I have argued that feminist biblical studies have to be critical, dialogical, practical, and emancipatory. They have to be oriented not only towards the academy but also towards living communities of faith and/or struggle. Rather than just being beholden to the elite academic study of the biblical past, feminist biblical interpretation has to work for people in and outside organized religions who search for a spiritual vision of justice and love. In contrast to malestream liberation and political the*logies, I have maintained that an emerging emancipatory paradigm of interpretation needs to be first of all critical, approaching the text with a hermeneutics of suspicion. This frame has allowed me to articulate the goal of feminist biblical studies as political studies engendering biblical visions for emancipatory praxis.25 Most importantly, I have sought to articulate this emancipatory goal not primarily in reaction to hegemonic biblical studies but in conversation with feminist, liberation the*logical, and postcolonial theories.26

23  See the excellent and clear contribution of Barbara J. Riesman, “Gender as Social Structure: Theory Wrestling with Activism,” in Joan Z. Spade and Catherine G. Valentine, eds., The Kaleidoscope of Gender: Prisms, Patterns, and Possibilities (Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publishers, 2007), 9–21. 24  See my books Democratizing Biblical Studies: Toward an Emancipatory Educational Space (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009) and Empowering Memory and Movement: Thinking and Working Across Borders (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2014). 25  See my books Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation (New York, NY: Continuum, 2000) and The Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007). 26  See my book Transforming Vision: Explorations in Feminist The*logy (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2011).

8   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza Feminist biblical studies, I have argued, seeks not only to place the Bible into the hands of people who struggle for justice but also needs to explicitly take into account that biblical interpreters are not only gendered but also racialized, classed, and colonialized. Whereas ecclesiastical and academic biblical studies have excluded wo/men from the authoritative interpretation of the Bible throughout the centuries, liberationist biblical studies seek to enable and resource critical feminist readers who are able not only to understand biblical texts and interpretation, but also to critically evaluate them in the struggle for a more egalitarian democratic society and religious community.27 It is the feminist liberation the*logical paradigm that first sought to shift the scholarly focus from the biblical texts to the community of interpretation.28 It could do so because it connected with the religious-hermeneutical tradition and sharpened it by adding ideology-criticism to its repertoire, a move that called for an ethics of interpretation. Feminist paradigm criticism is an important method for creating an alternative ethos/ space from which to transform biblical studies. Paradigm construction has developed a typology of shifting antagonistic practices that shape and determine the discipline of biblical studies and biblical interpretation on the whole. However, I have also argued for fruitful change to occur, the antagonistic rhetoric of paradigm change needs to be abandoned. Thomas Kuhn,29 the intellectual father of paradigm criticism, was certainly correct in observing that scientific paradigms arise in competition with each other and seek to replace each other. Looking at the history of the discipline of biblical studies, one can easily chart the field of biblical studies in such competitive terms. However, in the context of the emancipatory feminist paradigm, it seems more appropriate to chart paradigms as different scientific domains that correct and supplement each other. In other words, it is important to articulate paradigms not in combative but in collaborative terms. Paradigms can exist alongside each other, or they can be overlapping or remedial to each other. They can utilize each other’s methodological approaches or they can work in corrective interaction with each other. If one conceptualizes paradigms also in political and not only in disciplinary terms, one can integrate the spheres of the professional and the “ordinary” reader by delineating a paradigm as “a public intellectual sphere” where “citizen interpreters” come together to debate and discuss the Bible in terms of their own theoretical frameworks, methodological approaches, and spiritual interests. Such public spheres, including the academy, the church/synagogue, the school, and the individual, in which biblical studies are practiced are overlapping and not exclusive of each other. In order to communicate with each other, the “citizen interpreters” need to be clear not only about their different 27  For the Roman Catholic context of feminist struggles, see my book Discipleship of Equals: A Critical Feminist Ekkleia-logy of Liberation (New York, NY: Crossroad Publishing, 1993). 28  I prefer interpretation over reading since all wo/men can interpret stories and biblical texts but not all wo/men can read. See my book Changing Horizons: Exploration in Feminist Interpretation (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2012). 29  Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (third ed.; Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996).

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   9 theoretical languages, but also about their different spiritual-ideological emphases and goals. By articulating paradigms as different and overlapping practices in the “public sphere,” the dichotomizing tendencies that still haunt the discipline as well as minoritized criticism can be overcome. In such a political frame, feminist biblical studies can be seen as creating a “radical democratic critical public space” from which to interact with and challenge the*logical, historical, and cultural academic biblical studies to transform their intellectual structures of exclusion and domination. The stress on ideology-critique and on the analysis of power enables feminist biblical studies to facilitate border exchanges with other disciplines. However, feminist interpretation must not just be ideology critical but also constructive and visionary. It needs to articulate biblical visions of liberation and well-being that foster religious identity formations and spiritual discourses which transform the internalized intersecting structures of domination. Feminist biblical interpretation has the task not only of tracing the cultural biblical artifact and its work of domination and emancipation but also of asking what the biblical artifact does to those who submit to its world of vision. In order to pursue this task, feminist biblical studies needs to create the conditions for equal citizenship in its own public spheres. It can do so by articulating a theoretical platform capable of fostering critical and constructive exchanges and learnings between different approaches and groups that inhabit the diverse and ever-shifting space of feminist biblical interpretation. The inhabitants of this space need to pay careful attention to all the theoretical voices in their midst, avoid dualistic over and against constructions, and create common ground for the work of producing emancipatory radical democratic biblical knowledges.30

Feminist Analysis of Power (Part 1): Categories of Analysis Since the early 1990s, the category of patriarchy and the dualistic category of gender has become increasingly unsatisfactory for a critical analysis of power. Hence, I have proposed the concept of kyriarchy as a new analytic category that could understand gender in terms of the interstructuredness of oppressions. This new analytic category is derived from the Greek words kyrios and archein. It refers to the rule and reign of the emperor, lord, slave master, father, husband, the free propertied male citizen of ancient democracy. This coinage of kyriarchy was indebted not only to my studies of the N*T and Greco-Roman antiquity, but also to my religious location in Catholicism, where the 30  For such work, see my books But She Said: Feminist Practices of Biblical Interpretation (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1992); Wisdom Ways: Introducing Feminist Biblical Interpretation (New York, NY: Orbis Books, 2001).

10   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza liturgical invocation kyrie eleison (“Lord have mercy!”) is generally known because it is a frequent part of the liturgy. It is also an approximation of the German word Herrschaft, which is usually translated as domination, a translation derived from the Latin word dominus, which means “Lord.” This neologism signals that gender must be understood in terms of intersecting structures of domination. In short, kyriarchal democracies are stratified by shifting intersections of gender, race, class, religion, sexuality, ability, age, and other markers of domination. These intersections shape the social-structural positions that are assigned to us more or less by birth. Yet how people live these structural kyriarchal positions is conditioned not only by the structural positions themselves, but also by the subject positions through which we live them. Whereas an essentialist approach assigns to people an “authentic” identity that is derived from our structural position, one’s subject position becomes coherent and compelling through political discourse, interpretive frameworks, and the development of theoretical horizons regarding domination. For Christians and other religious believers, religion and Sacred Scriptures play a key role in shaping such subject positions. Feminist scholars in religion, therefore, insist that religious texts and traditions must be re-interpreted in such a way that wo/men and other “nonpersons” achieve full citizenship in religion and society, gain full access to decision-making powers, and live out radical equality in community. We argue that differences of sex/gender, race, class, and ethnicity are socio-culturally constructed; they are not willed by G*d and therefore must be changed. G*d, who created people in the divine image, is to be found in and among people who are created equal. In sum, a critical feminist theory articulates the subject of feminist struggles not on the basis of the essential difference of woman or of sociocultural gender differences. Rather, it does so in the interest of naming feminist subjects who struggle against neoliberal structures of domination.31 Wo/men are not just gendered but also determined by race,32 heteronormativity, class, or colonialism, as well as other markers of domination. Like those of gender, the social relations that give rise to theories of race, class, or ethnic differences are socio-culturally constructed as kyriarchal relations of domination. They are not biological givens. Nineteenth-century scientists constructed the so-called “lower races”—lower-class wo/men, the sexually deviant, the criminal, the urban poor, and the insane—as biological “races apart.” Their differences from the white male and their likeness to each other “explained” their lower position in the social hierarchy. In this scheme, the lower races represent the “feminine” aspect of the human species, and wo/men represent the “lower race” of gender. Thus, wo/men do not share a unitary essence but are multiple and fractured in many different ways by race, class, age, sexuality, ability, and gender. Hence, it is important to see gender as one among several structures of domination constructed to 31  See Jutta Sommerbauer, Differenzen zwischen Frauen: Zur Positionsbestimming und Kritik des postmodernen Feminismus (Münster: Unrast, 2003). 32  Eske Wollrad, Weißsein im Widerspruch: Feministische Perspektiven auf Rassismus, Kultur und Religion (Königstein / Taunus: Ulrike Helmer Verlag, 2005).

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   11 serve the division of power and wealth by sex, economics, race, culture, nationality, and  religion. A critical feminist theory and practice does not only destabilize the essentialist markers of woman and gender, but also those of hetero-normativity, race, class, ­colonialism, age, disability, and other markers of dehumanization. In short, a dualistic gender analysis does not suffice in biblical and religious studies because gender has been constructed in antiquity as kyriarchal in terms of the status of the freeborn lord (kyrios) or lady (kyria), and in modern times in terms of class, coloniality,33 and race status. Consequently, an intersectional kyriarchal analysis is necessary.

Feminist Analysis of Power (Part 2): Intersectionality The analytic object of feminist theory and the*logy as pointed out before is not simply “woman” or “gender” but the intersectionality34 of domination, of kyriarchy, that is a sociopolitical and cultural-religious system of domination that structures the identity slots open to members of society in terms of race, gender, nation, age, economy, and sexuality. At the same time the analytic object of feminist theory and theology configures “woman” and “gender” as pyramidal relations of domination and submission, profit and exploitation. Kyriarchy is best theorized as a complex pyramidal system of intersecting multiplicative social and religious relations of superordination and subordination, of ruling and exploitation. Kyriarchal relations of domination are built on elite male property rights and the exploitation, dependency, inferiority, and obedience of wo/men.35 The Western kyriarchal system works simultaneously on four levels: the linguisticsymbolic level, the sociopolitical level, the ethical-cultural level, and the biological-natural level. They are intertwined and strengthen each other’s power of domination. Diverse feminist approaches, such as womanist, queer, Latina, or postcolonial the*logies, work 33  For this concept, see Maria Lugones, “Heterosexualism and the Colonial Modern Gender System,” Hypatia 22.1 (2007): 186–209; “Toward a Decolonial Feminism,” Hypatia 25.4 (2010): 742–59. See also Reina Lewis and Sara Mills, eds., Feminist Postcolonial Theory: A Reader (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2003). 34  See especially Patricia Hill Collins and Sirma Bilge, Intersectionality (Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2016); and also my introduction to Laura Nasrallah and Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, eds., Prejudice and Christian Beginnings: Investigating Race, Gender and Ethnicity in Early Christian Studies (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2009), 1–26; Gabriele Winker and Nina Degele, Intersektionalität: Zur Analyse sozialer Ungleichheiten (Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2009); Helma Lutz, Marie Theresa Herrera Vivar, and Linda Supik, eds., Fokus Intersektionalität: Bewegungen und Verortungen eines vielschichtigen Konzepts (Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 2010); Sharon Doetsch-Kidder, Social Change and Intersectional Activism (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012). 35  I write wo/man with a slash to indicate that the word is understood to signify all those who are subordinated and exploited. Hence, wo/men includes also such a man, but it does not signify “lady.”

12   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza on different nodal sites of the intersecting discourse levels of kyriarchy and hence emphasize different aspects of the kyriarchal system. Usually, intersectional theorists conceptualize such social and ideological structures of domination as hierarchical in order to map and make visible the complex interstructuring of the conflicting status positions of different wo/men. They understand neoliberal modes of gender exploitation as hierarchically structured. However, such a labeling of intersecting neoliberal global structures of domination as “hierarchical,” “holy,” and sacrosanct ascribes them to G*d or religion rather than to the agents of domination. Hence, it is important that, in the process of naming neoliberal domination, the concept of kyriarchy replaces the socio-analytic concept of hierarchy. In short, a critical intersectional feminist analytic does not understand domination as an essentialist, ahistorical, and dualistic system. Instead, it articulates kyriarchy as a heuristic (derived from the Greek, meaning “to find”) concept or as a diagnostic instrument that enables investigation into the multiplicative interactivity of gender, race, class, and imperial stratifications. Such an analytic also needs to research kyriarchy’s discursive inscriptions and ideological reproductions. Moreover, such an analytic highlights that people inhabit several shifting structural positions of race, sex, gender, class, and ethnicity, all at the same time. If one subject position of domination becomes privileged, it constitutes a nodal point. While at any particular historical moment, class or imperialism may be the primary modality through which one experiences class, imperialism, gender, and race, in other circumstances gender may be the privileged position through which one experiences sexuality, imperialism, race, and class.

Quilting Democratics Insofar as neoliberal transnational kyriarchal capitalism crosses all borders, exploits all peoples, and colonizes all citizens, it requires a counter-vision and dissident strategy. Chela Sandoval formulates “democratics,” a strategy and vision which has affinities with my effort to articulate the space of the ekklēsia of wo/men36 as a critical radical democratic space of interpretation. Since the signifier “wo/man” is increasingly used by right-wing religions to draw exclusive boundaries, it is important to mark linguistically the difference between religion as kyriarchal institution and religion as ekklēsia, as the decision-making radical democratic congress of the people of G*d. Hence, ekklēsia is best understood as signifying a radical democratic congress of fully entitled, responsible decision-making citizens. As such it has never been fully realized either in Christian history or in Western democracy. Hence the expression ekklēsia gynaikōn, the ekklēsia of wo/men, functions as a linguistic means of conscientization. 36  For an excellent critical discussion of this concept, see Janine Jobling, Feminist Biblical Interpretation in Theological Context: Restless Readings (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2002) 32–60; 142–63.

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   13 Sandoval explains democratics as one of the methods of the oppressed in the following way: With the transnationalization of capitalism when elected officials are no longer leaders of singular nation-states but nexuses for multinational interests, it also becomes possible for citizen-subjects to become activists for a new decolonizing global terrain, a psychic terrain that can unite them with similarly positioned citizensubjects within and across national borders into new, post-Western–empire ­alliances . . . . Love as social movement is enacted by revolutionary, mobile, and global coalitions of citizen-activists who are allied through the apparatus of emancipation.37

Although I appreciate Sandoval’s vision of the democratics as “a new decolonizing global terrain,” I am hesitant to claim “love” as the sole revolutionary force or to reduce “oppositional social action only to a mode of ‘love’ in the postmodern world.”38 I am well aware that numerous 2/3rd World feminists in the United States have eloquently written about the power of love in struggles for justice,39 but I cannot forget the function of “romantic love” either in the oppression of wo/men or in the anti-Jewish valorization of  the “N*w”40 Testament “G*d of Love” over the “Old” Testament “God of Justice.” Democratics, in my view, must be equally informed by justice, as Patricia Hill Collins suggests: Justice transcends Western notions of equality grounded in sameness and uni­form­ ity. . . . In making their quilts Black women weave together scraps of fabric from all sorts of places. Nothing is wasted, and every piece of fabric has a function and a place in a given quilt. . . . [T]hose who conceptualize community via notions of uni­ form­ity and sameness have difficulty imagining a social quilt that is simultaneously heterogeneous, driven toward excellence, and just.41

In this image of quilt and quilting for the making of justice, the decolonizing practices of a global democratics, of the ekklēsia of wo/men, and a critical feminist dissident global interpretation converge. In short, a critical-rhetorical understanding of interpretation investigates and reconstructs the discursive arguments of a text, its socio-religious location, and its diverse interpretations in order to underscore the text’s possible oppressive as well as liberative performative values, and possibilities in ever-changing historical-cultural situations. 37  Chela Sandoval, Methodology of the Oppressed (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2000), 183. 38  Ibid. 183. 39  To name just a few, see, e.g., Audre Lorde, bell hooks, Toni Morrison, Cornel West, June Jordan, Gloria Anzaldúa, Maria Lugones, Merle Woo, or Alice Walker. 40  Here the asterisk draws attention to the danger of supersessionism in the label “New Testament.” 41  Patricia Hill Collins, Fighting Words: Black Women and the Search for Justice (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1998), 248–9.

14   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza It understands the Bible and biblical interpretation as a site of struggle over authority, values, and meaning. Since the socio-historical location of rhetoric is the public of the polis, this rhetorical-emancipatory approach seeks to situate biblical scholarship in such a way that its public character and political responsibility become an integral part of its contemporary readings and historical reconstructions of the biblical artifact. It insists on an ethical radical democratic imperative that compels biblical scholarship to contribute to the advent of a society and religion that are free from all forms of kyriarchal inequality and exploitation.

Toward Critical Political Biblical Studies (Part 1): Speaking with an Emancipatory Accent The conceptualization of feminist emancipatory biblical studies as a critical quilting of meaning in different socio-political locations enables us not only to deconstruct the kyriarchal ideological inscriptions of the biblical past but also to articulate a biblical spirituality and emancipatory vision of justice and well-being for all. To transform the past of biblical studies, one needs to chart the emancipatory paradigm of biblical studies as a new field of inquiry. If the biblical past should have a future, this paradigm must be emancipatory, since its task is not just postmodern ideological deconstruction but also the production of spiritual emancipatory knowledge of re-vision and re-memory. Such a critical feminist emancipatory paradigm requires a change of the following three areas of biblical studies: (1) the the*logical understanding of scripture, (2) the reading of kyriarchal texts, and (3) the conceptualization of history. First, an emancipatory paradigm must relinquish both the apologetic defense of the Bible and the critical scholarly disinterest in the*logical interpretation. It has to wrestle the*logically with the understanding of the Bible as divine revelation and with the ­estimation of the Bible as a cultural classic to be approached with a hermeneutic of appreciation and trust rather than a hermeneutics of suspicion. Hence, it is important to  transform the doctrinal-cultural paradigm of authority and to define scripture the*logically not as a dogmatic archetype but as a the*logical prototype open for transformation. Whether biblical scholars are religious believers or not, we have to wrestle with the Bible not only as a historical and political artifact but also as Scripture and to articulate emancipatory interpretations of biblical texts because millions of disenfranchised wo/men still read the Bible searching for visions of hope and strength in the struggles against the dehumanizing powers of neoliberalism. Because of its ideological inscriptions, the Bible as Scripture and as cultural-political artifact must be approached not only with a hermeneutics of suspicion and evaluation but also with a hermeneutics of imagination, remembrance, and transformation. Reinterpreting a long the*logical tradition that found its way into Vatican II’s writings,

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   15 I insist on an emancipatory specification of revelation. Rather than to rely on a “canon within the canon” approach, I have argued that a critical feminist emancipatory paradigm also has the the*logical task of exploring what G*d wanted to put into Sacred Scripture for the sake of our, i.e. wo/men’s, salvation or well-being. In other words, kyriarchal texts and histories have no truth claims as legitimators of oppression. Indeed, they must be critically analyzed and evaluated in their socio-political contexts if G*d’s salvific intention should be “revealed” in the process of interpretation. Whether biblical scholars of the emancipatory paradigm are believers or not, we have to analyze the the*logical rhetoric of Scripture in its different socio-cultural and religious contexts. Second, the emancipatory paradigm of biblical studies has to confront the power of biblical language. In a grammatically androcentric and kyriocentric (lord/master) centered language system, wo/men always have to think twice and to deliberate whether we are meant or not when we are told, for example, that “all men are created equal” or that we are “sons of G*d.” Religious-biblical language tells us that we are made in the image of G*d, who is generally portrayed as male. When reading the Bible as Sacred Scripture or as a Western cultural classic, wo/men internalize not only that the Divine is male and not female but also that wo/men are second-class citizens subordinated to male authority. Simply by learning to speak or to pray, wo/men learn that we are marginal and insignificant “second-class members” of society and religion. It seems to me, therefore, that only those 2/3rd World feminist scholars who have not been socialized into a Western andro-kyriocentric language system and whose language systems are not gendered in the same way can break the power of biblical male-centered language. Only scholars who have grown up in such different language systems are able to make significant contributions to feminist emancipatory translation, thought, and the*logy. Critical feminist emancipatory research is still very much lacking such work, and it promises to become a very fecund area of study in the emancipatory fourth paradigm.42 Third, the civil rights movement and other liberation movements around the globe have argued that it is a sign of oppression not to have a written history. Hence, the rewriting and re-conceptualization of “His-story” in a different key was and is an essential task for emancipation and liberation. Historiography in general and biblical history in particular have to relinquish antiquarian moorings and elite orientation. Such work has to recover history as memory and re-membrance. In writing In Memory of Her,43 I tried to do just that. I was not so much interested in writing woman’s history in Early Christianity but to write Early Christian history in a feminist key. I explored whether our sources allow us to frame Early Christian history so that not merely men but also wo/men are remembered as central actors in and shapers of early Christian communities and as 42  See, however, the very interesting article of Satoko Yamaguchi, “Father Image of G*d and Inclusive Language: A Reflection in Japan,” in Toward a New Heaven and a New Earth: Essays in Honor of Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed. Fernando Segovia (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2003), 199–224. We need much more such intercultural research on biblical translation and interpretation in non-androcentric language contexts. 43  See my book In Memory of Her: A Feminist Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1983).

16   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza articulators of a religious vision. Since the story we tell about origins and beginnings shapes our identity, I continue to argue that it is necessary to tell early Christian history differently. I thus proposed a model of struggle that moves between shifting egalitarian relations on the one hand and kyriarchal dominations on the other. My book In Memory of Her is often read in terms of the Protestant model of “pure” beginnings and rapid deterioration into patriarchy. However, such a reading is a misreading because it does not grasp the historiographical and political model of struggle undergirding the arguments of my book. These struggles did not end in the second century ce but they are still with us today, shaping not only Christian but also Western history. In contrast to some postmodern literary theorists who eschew the writing of history as “what must be remembered,” I believe that it is important to change historical biblical studies in the interest of liberation/emancipation if the biblical past is to have a feminist emancipatory future. Rather than re-inscribing the disciplinary divisions between the*logical and scientific interpretation, between literary and historical methods, between socio-political and religious approaches, or between social-sociological and ideological–religious criticism, I continue to argue that critical feminist emancipatory studies must work for a paradigm shift that can overcome these dualisms by conceptualizing biblical studies as a rhetorics and ethics of inquiry and transformation. To conceptualize the emancipatory paradigm of biblical studies as a rhetorics of inquiry and ethics of transformation would engender research in the following areas of interpretation that constitute the fourth emancipatory paradigm:

1. A hermeneutics of experience: global experience and socio-political-religious location of the subjects of biblical knowledge. 2. A hermeneutics of domination: a systemic structural socio-political analysis of the rhetorical and historical situation. 3. A hermeneutics of suspicion: an ideology and language critique, a critique of method and epistemology, cultural and literary criticism, as well as a critique of religion and the*logy. 4. A hermeneutics of evaluation: the ethical and the*logical evaluation of texts and  interpretations as to how they serve global domination or equality and well-being. 5. A hermeneutics of imagination: the cultivation of the interpretive scholarly imagination and ritualization of texts and traditions to create the “other worlds” that we desire and strive for. 6. A hermeneutics of historical remembrance: the rewriting of biblical history as emancipatory historical reconstruction, as memory and heritage in the struggle for liberation and well-being. 7. A hermeneutics of transformation: the critical praxis of change and transformation in a global world of domination. These seven areas of feminist emancipatory research require transdisciplinary ­collaboration and the formulation of new methods of inquiry.

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   17 At the same time, these seven areas of research require translation into a practical pedagogical guide for interpretation. I have formulated and developed the Dance of Interpretation that encompasses the following hermeneutical steps: a hermeneutics of experience, a hermeneutics of domination, a hermeneutics of suspicion, a hermeneutics of evaluation, a hermeneutics of imagination, a hermeneutics of historical remembrance, and a hermeneutics of transformation. This dance script can easily be activated through common sense questions put to the text and to ourselves.44

Toward Critical Political Biblical Studies (Part 2): Combating Neoliberalism to Recover a Religious Language of Hope With these seven steps of the interpretive “dance,” a critical feminist interpretation for liberation facilitates conscientization and cultural, social, religious, and disciplinary transformation in the age of neoliberal devastations. A critical feminist interpretation seeks to provide intellectual and spiritual resources to biblical readers, whether they are biblical scholars or citizen-readers, to combat the spirit of neoliberalism. Such a critical feminist interpretation seeks to provide the intellectual means for such work in this age of exploitation. Feminist emancipatory scholarly and citizen-based reading practices articulate rhetorics, methods, and ethics of inquiry for the emancipatory feminist work of changing not only academic biblical studies but also of making conscious the all-consuming rhetoric of the neoliberal regime. The work of a critical feminist biblical interpretation for liberation is increasingly important but exceedingly difficult in the face of global neoliberal exploitation and the hostile corporate takeover of both the commonwealth of the nations and of higher education not only in North America but also around the globe. As Henry Giroux details in his book Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education,45 the hostile takeover of education by corporate market forces with its vicious and predatory excesses is in the process of undermining democratic processes and of radically reshaping the mission and practices of higher education. It reduces human values and experiences to data that can be measured and monetized in the capitalist marketplace. Neoliberalism’s multipronged assault produces cultural illiteracy, denies the resources for democratic collaboration, reduces human values and learning to that which can be measured, and undermines higher education’s ability to foster values like caring for each other. The values and mindsets of neoliberalism’s agenda are practiced every semester 44  For an example of the hermeneutical dance with a scriptural text, see my study guide: 1 Peter: Reading against the Grain (New York, NY: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017), 62–77. 45  Henry Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2014).

18   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza with a “shopping” period during which professors have to advertise their wares to attract student consumers who at the end of the semester evaluate the products purchased. The ramifications of neoliberal marketization of social assets and values are also detailed in Saskia Sassen’s upsetting and frightening book Expulsions.46 Her core hypothesis is “that the move from Keynesian economics to the global era of privatization, deregulation, and open borders for some, entailed a switch from dynamics that brought people in to dynamics that push people out.”47 The world that was built in the twentieth century after the devastating genocide and starvation of the Second World War she argues, was driven by “a logic of inclusion,” by efforts of bringing minorities and the poor into the political and economic mainstream. However, at the end of the century the Keynesian nation-based project of building a just society began to give way to two neoliberal shifts across the world in the 1980s. The first shift required the global outsourcing of manufacturing services, clerical work, harvesting of human organs, and the raising of unregulated crops as well as the active making of global cities as strategic spaces that function as a new geography of austerity cutting across the old East/West and North/South divisions. The second shift produced the ascendance of finance in the network of global cities. As a consequence, it economically impoverished and excluded of people who have ceased to be valued as consumers and workers. Hence, governments saw a need to reduce government debt, social welfare programs, and government regulations of the markets. Sassen explains: “Anything or anybody, whether a law or a civic effort, that gets in the way of profit risks being pushed aside—expelled.”48 This development has now climaxed with Trumpism in the United States. It threatens to tear apart the social fabric and to subvert all human rights and democratic processes. Fundamentalist religion has played and will play a significant role in the ideological neoliberal takeover. Since neoliberalism has enlisted religious fundamentalisms for promoting its goals, feminist and other emancipatory biblical studies have become very important in the struggle against the dehumanizing mindsets, lies, and ideologies of neoliberalism. However, I do not see a concerted effort to address the overall impact of neoliberalism’s antidemocratic market forces. Some efforts attempt to respond to single issues as for instance gay marriage or the impoverishment of children, but not much is done about the biblical foundations of social responsibility in a neoliberal age and its implications for biblical studies. Giroux points the way to such a critical constructive response: This is about more than reclaiming the virtues of dialogue, exchange and translation. It is about recovering a politics and inventing a language that can create democratic public squares in which new subjects and identities can be produced that are capable of recognizing and addressing the plight of the other and struggling collectively to expand and deepen the struggle for justice, freedom and democratization. . . . We need a language of hope, one that is realistic rather than romantic about the challenges 46  Saskia Sassen, Expulsions: Brutality and Complexity in the Global Economy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014). 47  Ibid., 211. 48  Ibid., 213.

Biblical Interpretation and Kyriarchal Globalization   19 the planet is facing and yet electrified by a realization that things can be different, that possibilities can not only be imagined but engaged, fought for, and realized in collective struggles.49

Seen in this light, the task of feminist biblical interpretation is to recover the Bible as a political artifact not only for indicting neoliberal structures of dehumanization, but also for recovering a democratic-religious language of hope, dignity, and love.

Conclusion I want to end with a quote of Melissa Harris-Perry who evokes the power of religion in a speech at the Take Back the American Dream Conference in Washington, D.C. She argues that racism, anti-immigrant panic, and the war on women drive contemporary U.S. politics. She refers to the faith of her grandmother who was sold as a slave to tell us “not to be afraid of each other,” stating: What I do know is that my enslaved grandmother who was sold on a street corner in Richmond, Virginia, believed in God. Now, I’m not asking you to believe in God; I’m asking you to think about this: This is a woman who never knew anything but slavery for herself, never knew anything but slavery for everyone she’d ever been related to, never expected anything but slavery for all of the people she would be related to in the future. There was no empirical evidence that any being cared about her circumstances. There was no empirical evidence that there was a loving God who had any power. And if there was a loving God, he was pretty pitiful, or if he was powerful, he didn’t seem to love her.

This statement gestures toward the task of feminist biblical interpretation in the age of neoliberal Trumpism that threatens global survival. Harris-Perry goes on to say: I’m not asking you to believe in God or to accept any kind of supreme being. I’m asking you to think about the faith that is associated with the hope that is not necessarily rooted in the empirical realities you see around you right at this moment, that says that we can still be part of something that is bigger than ourselves, and something that we cannot necessarily see at the moment, but simply requires us not to be afraid of each other. Because it’s our fear of each other that makes us exceptionally easy to divide.50

49 Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education, 204. 50  This is a transcript of a speech delivered at the “Take Back the American Dream” conference, produced by the “Campaign for America’s Future,” located in Washington, D.C., on June 18, 2012. Available online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRc-slwNJUo.

20   elisabeth schüssler fiorenza Feminist interpretation of the biblical artifact must seek to find scriptural resources to strengthen this call.

Bibliography Giroux, Henry. Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Toronto: Between the Lines, 2014. Hill Collins, Patricia, and Sirma Bilge. Intersectionality. Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2016. Nasrallah, Laura, and Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, eds. Prejudice and Christian Beginnings. Investigating Race, Gender and Ethnicity in Early Christian Studies. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2009. Sassen, Saskia. Expulsions: Brutality and Complexity in the Global Economy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014. Scholz, Susanne. The Bible as a Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2017. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. In Memory of Her: A Feminist Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins. New York, NY: Crossroad, 1983. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. Jesus and the Politics of Interpretation. New York, NY: Continuum, 2000. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. The Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2007. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. Democratizing Biblical Studies: Toward an Emancipatory Educational Space. Louisville, KY: WJK Press, 2009. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. Transforming Vision: Explorations in Feminist The*logy. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2011. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. Empowering Memory and Movement: Thinking and Working Across Borders. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2014. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth, ed. Feminist Biblical Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014.

chapter 2

The Bible a n d H um a n R ights from a Femi n ist Perspecti v e Carole R. Fontaine

Human rights refer to a body of rights, and concomitant duties, that belong to all human beings by their membership in the species of Homo sapiens, without regard to any distinction of sex, race, class, age, legality, nationality, religion, gender orientation, ability, or state of health. Such rights are presumed to be universal and inalienable. Although various cultures may differ concerning the origin and specificity of these rights, all governing states are expected to secure them for their citizens. Often, it is easier to understand human rights (or more precisely, their enjoyment) in their negative statement: humans ought not to be enslaved, used for sex, or be subjected to genocide; humans ought not to be tortured, or harvested for food or body parts; civilians, hospitals, and prisoners should not to be targeted in wars, and so on. Each negative formulation argues for a positive “right” which is being violated: right to life, right to bodily integrity, dignity, food, or safety. While societies may enumerate these rights differently, since ancient times all groups have proposed a view of what constitutes a common good for human life. However, as noted below, that vision of a common good was never actually extended to humanity.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) From such a jus cogens (a form of law akin to religious concepts of natural law—known through reason and observation rather than promulgation), modern legal and philosophical discourse has distilled a basic set of rights which, in theory, apply universally

22   Carole R. Fontaine and are now gathered in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). While earlier covenants on rights, often derived from conduct in war, preceded the UDHR, in 1948 this groundbreaking work brought together the nations of the world in the aftermath of the devastation and genocides of the Second World War. Fueled with a sense of enhanced urgency in the face of the past horrors and new threats of nuclear war, thinkers from different world cultures, religions, and disciplines came together to review the best of humanity’s thoughts and practices for securing peace on a global, national, and even personal level in a hard-fought quest for a truly inclusive document. The UDHR has proved durable as a “user’s manual” of best practices for the human race, inviting societies, groups, and peoples to measure themselves against its targets. It should be noted, however, that the signatories to the UDHR are only urged to comply with its mandates; the treaty itself has no measures of enforcement. For some, this renders the UDHR a lovely abstraction, but scarcely one with which any state feels obligated to comply. Despite moral sanctions, the international community of human rights advocates and agencies usually rely on public exposure of abuses and concomitant shame on the part of those who commit them. Objectively, it hardly seems that commission of heinous acts (crimes against humanity) or broad human rights violations present any particular bar to holding public office, seizing power, or retaining it. Much needs to be done in growing the world’s moral conscience to extend it beyond one’s own family, group, nation, and region. The UDHR, for all its problems, still presents a viable roadmap for evolution into a cooperative, healthy world.

“ESC”: Rights in Three Tiers The UDHR outlines rights in three basic sets. First, personal liberties are set forth in the first nineteen articles (right to life, freedom of thought, speech, and religion; freedom to marry; right to geographic movement; etc.), principles owing much of their origin to the European Enlightenment. Second, articles 20–26 deal with economic rights (right to work, right to time off, right to safe working conditions, etc.) and grew out of the Industrial Revolution and the struggles of trade unions. Third, articles 27–28 owe their origin to socialist movements. These rights emphasize community and nation as sources of affiliation which play a role for the good in human social life.1 These interlocking sets of rights can be imagined as lodged in the individual and family (articles 1–19), moving out into their nested placement within economic settings (articles 20–26), which in turn are contextualized within a community/region/state/nation (articles 27–28). The three groups of rights are commonly referred to as ESC, economic, social, and cultural rights (the ESC in agencies like UNESCO). All rights must be enjoyed together for experience 1  Michelene Ishay, The History of Human Rights: From Ancient Times to the Globalization Era, with a New Preface (Berkeley, CA: University of California, 2008), 18.

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   23 of the fullness of a common good, and a society will flourish only to the extent that its people are empowered to do so. This is the vision toward which a “global ethic” should set its path.

Problems in the Human Rights Model The acceptance of a universal concept of human rights continues to unfold today. Since the UDHR is situated in human experience, it is subject to amendment as it moves through time as issues change. For instance, the communist threat to “freedom of religion” during the twentieth-century Cold War has yielded to worries about global security, especially during mass migrations. Even at the time of promulgation, strong disagreements existed between signatories based on different religious, political, or cultural practices. Conversion to other religions, inheritance for daughters, female consent for and minimum age for marriage were stumbling blocks for Islamic states; communist nations balked at freedom of speech and freedom to worship. South Africa protested in order to keep Apartheid, and the racially segregated U.S.A. could not tolerate the idea of interracial marriage, a touchstone issue which actually masked a whole series of rights abuses toward African American citizens.2 As time passed, some of these issues found tentative resolution, but more problems were unveiled. The United Nations has not proved to be the robust institution for adjudicating global conflict that many had hoped in the postwar era; global poverty, human trafficking, mass migration, and global warming in the age of diminishing carbon fuel have posed problems and questions that will continue to challenge the flexibility of the human rights paradigm. Yet, there has never been a time when the planet is more in need of a global ethic.

Western Biases in Human Rights Discourse One major problem posed by critics of the human rights approach is its origin in Western colonial hegemony, which routinely used issues of “civilization” as an ideological weapon in its quest for power and resources. Other cultures ask, and rightly so, if the predominance of Western historical influences in human rights documents and history (Greek and Roman law, biblical and Jewish legal traditions, Christian ethics, medieval scholasticism, Magna Carta, Covenant on the Rights of Man, Geneva Conventions, etc.) does not make human rights discourse into an indelible tool for advancing Western 2  Grace Kao, Grounding Human Rights in a Pluralist World (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2011), 86.

24   Carole R. Fontaine conquest and economic domination. If so, then the indigenous ethics of peoples whose social, economic, and cultural traditions operate differently will ipso facto be judged inferior. In particular, the emphasis on the more modern personal “political” freedoms of the individual run counter to the “group ethic” of solidarity that permeates Asian ­philosophy, Islamic societies and traditions, and socialist countries. The first set of rights in the UDHR not only seem to present a point-for-point Cold War statement against communist praxis, but are also ideally suited to urge non-Western countries to participate in a robber-baron capitalism that decimates the normal group ethics of their societies. Any objection may then be judged as “backward” and “anti-trade.” Similarly, in light of the post–September 11 “Global War on Terror,” the United States’ sudden interest in human rights issues in Muslim-majority countries seems highly suspect due to that nation’s considerable tolerance for despotic crimes against humanity perpetrated by Islamic dictators who remain favorable to U.S. strategic goals. Particularly thorny are issues of “religious freedom” which rise to the level of political action: it is clear from multiple analyses that the “freedoms” being invoked there are anything but universal!3 In fact, religious freedom is far more likely to mask a clear cultural imperative to protect one’s own “proper” religion from someone else’s “wrong” religion, particularly active around issues of gender. This situation is hardly what the UDHR envisioned. Although the “cultural rights” section of the UDHR is the least well developed of all the categories of rights, a situation which exists throughout the UN-system at large.4 When the tenets of in-group “freedom of religion” are directed at ethnic or religious minorities, female empowerment, or those who are other than heterosexual, a clear departure from the human rights goals has been taken in favor of using the tool of “rights” discourse to restrict and in extreme cases even deny others’ right to life.

Human Rights: Religious or Humanist? Depending on whether one thinks that human rights are an entirely humanist project (so-called human rights “minimalists”) or deeply rooted in a religious world view (human rights “maximalists”),5 no one can deny the historical impact of the biblical tradition on the development of human rights discourse in the West.6 For maximalists, the ancient teachings about human life, its value and destiny, found in the Bible are often thought to be an indispensable underpinning for the pursuit of the realization of the goals of modern human rights discourse and activism. However, while there are significant areas of contact in terms of content and desirable outcomes, both approaches to 3  Elizabeth A. Castelli, “Theologizing Human Rights: Christian Activism and the Limits of Religious Freedom,” Non-Governmental Politics (2007): 673–88. 4  Janusz Symonides, “Cultural Rights: A Neglected Category of Human Rights,” International Social Science Journal 50.158 (December 1998): 559–72. 5 Kao, Grounding Human Rights, pp. 134–46, 31–56. 6  Nicholas Wolterstorff, Justice: Rights and Wrongs (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008).

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   25 humanity’s well-being share significant differences in terms of their origin and key beliefs about the nature of human worth and dignity. Said differences extend into the arenas of where supporting “laws” should be applied and who should enforce them in order to achieve “universal” goals: the Bible lodges the demands of righteousness toward one’s neighbor in the community and individual believer. Modern human rights discourse looks to state actors to implement policy for groups, rather than individuals. In practice, both sets of approaches—biblical and modern legal discourse about rights—are often at direct odds with each other as they interact with a plethora of modern issues. These include, but are not limited to: state sovereignty versus individual choice, group versus individual rights, cultural differences versus hegemony of so-called human “universals,” ancient versus modern understandings of “the person,” “group,” or “state.” These conflicts become particularly pointed when they intersect with concerns of pressing global significance such as the right to economic development and growth, global security, protection of the environment (climate change), human trafficking, freedom of religion, understanding of human sexual differences, frontiers of medical experimentation, and population management. Nevertheless, it is both possible and necessary that each set of approaches and concerns interrogate and enhance the other. Such interaction leads to a broader and more complete pharmacopeia of methods for easing human ills and creating a greater good, especially in a globalized, interdependent world at risk. It might also be noted that as humanity sets its face toward exploring—and exploiting!—other environments beyond our own planet, it would be prudent to develop a genuinely inclusive way to think about worth and dignity of life which might expand to include other habitats and forms of life beyond those we currently know.

The Problem of Women’s Rights in Human Rights Discourse: A Feminist Assessment Pressing global threats create an imperative for finding ways in which groups may work across boundaries to value all life on the planet. Among other things, this requires systems of thought and action where the worth and dignity of women and children are held as dearly as that of men. As noted above, no culture has ever managed to extend its view of “rights” to the totality of its population: the invariable groups who were denied full participation as humans in their communities are women (and their children), slaves or indentured servants, and non-heterosexuals.7 Other groups, varying by culture, might also find themselves excluded: migrants, ethnic or religious minorities, the disabled, and so on, but our discussion here will concentrate on the situation for women as full 7 Ishay, The History of Human Rights, 7, 47–61.

26   Carole R. Fontaine possessors of human worth and dignity. These omissions in the groups “covered” by human rights promulgations are hardly trivial. If we suppose that females constitute roughly half of the world’s population at any given time, and those other than heterosexual account for about 10 to 15 percent of the general population, then even without being able to calculate the amount of people held as slaves or in perpetual servitude, we can surmise that, at any given time, well over half the world’s population was excluded from consideration as participants in the “good life.”

Religious Devaluation The devaluation of women and children as moral beings and agents in the majority of world nations and religions has been well documented in scholarship and ethnological studies. Sadly, it can be shown that the human rights of women and children are held as second-class in importance to the “rights of Man” in every setting, whether ancient or modern, religious or secular, theological or legal. In particular, the asymmetrical religious doctrines of women’s sinfulness along with children’s status as property in the patriarchal household have both left their imprint on law and norms concerning the worth and full personhood of women and children under secular law. Classical philosophy— important to us here because that is where minimalists locate the origin of secular human rights discourse—has done no better: its own unfavorable analysis of the ­personhood and rights of women often betrays even more bias than the biblical and religious materials in question.8 The outcome is that the rights of Woman and her offspring have been easily dismissed as inferior in importance to almost any other consideration in the matter at hand by those (elite in-group males) making decisions. The generally accepted principle of “progressive realization” of human rights goals, where more pressing issues are given precedence, allows gender issues to be assigned low priority for implementation.

Philosophical Devaluation In the West, binary thinking has preferred to consider the world between the dual poles of mind and body where, for lovers of knowledge (philosophia), the mind/spirit takes pride of place as both the subject studied, and the tool by which that study is conducted (through the medium of language (logos) in antiquity). When Man names himself as 8  Carole R. Fontaine, “ ‘Many Devices’ (Qoh. 7:23–8:1): Qoheleth, Misogyny and the Malleus Maleficarum,” in A Feminist Companion to Wisdom and Psalms, ed. Athalya Brenner and Carole R. Fontaine (Second Series; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998), 137–68; Jane Barr, “The Vulgate Genesis and St. Jerome’s Attitude to Women,” Studia Patristica 17.1–3 (1982), 268–73.

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   27 mind, Woman is assigned to the lesser position of body/matter.9 After all, she is not only the source of new bodies, she is a pernicious reminder to men of their own bodily desires and needs throughout their entire life cycle. For those who would see themselves as disembodied minds that order their worlds, it is something of a comedown to experience the cravings of the embodied self that women supply, from a clean diaper, to dinner, to sex, to hospice care. Women chain men to earth in ways that violate their socially nurtured desires for authority and agency. Disappearing them is no answer; dinner must still be served. For all these murky reasons, the category of “Woman” in male philosophy has most often been associated with nature—a raw resource which is wild, untamed, in need of male rationality to control and harness its monstrous powers. Man, on the other hand, has been associated with culture—rationality, the intellectual creation of meaning, norms, and all that is “human.” Men make history, Women make babies, food, and clothing.10 Children are, like their mothers, wild and uncivilized. Male culture requires women to transform babies into rational, orderly citizens so that boys might move into the male public world created by the intellect and its devices. Girls, by contrast, are destined to join the private world of unpaid sexual slaves and household drudges through marriage or prostitution. Hence, the concerns of men and their institutions are posed as priority issues for the success and evolution of culture (as defined by male elites in the system), and so must naturally subsume those of women and children, who exist to serv­ice and extend the patriarchal family. Appeals to the sanctity of the “family” as the “natural” economic and spiritual foundation of most of the world’s cultures actually mask the concerns of extending male privilege and comfort into the future. Appeals to the “traditional” family reinforce the exclusion of those other than heterosexual from full human participation, soothing male fears of unruly sexuality by invoking “religious freedom” to impose supposed normativity.11 This move also reframes egoistic desires for personal power as both continuity of tradition, and/or progress to a new and better order! Where philosophy and family customs have shaped legal traditions, we find that women and children have not fared particularly well. This tradition explains the late arrival of the presence of women and children explicitly protected and called out as possessors of human rights in the modern era.12 However, for all the problems with Western philosophy and religious traditions, they both represent predominant sources for human rights thinking, for historical reasons of the social development in the West and not necessarily because of the superiority of its traditions or theology. The secular, material struggles of the West, freeing its thought 9  Hilde Hein, “Liberating Philosophy: An End to the Dichotomy of Spirit and Matter,” in Women, Knowledge and Reality: Explorations in Feminist Philosophy, ed. Ann Garry and Marilyun Pearsall (second ed.; New York, NY: Routledge, 1996), 437–53. 10  Sally Haslanger, “Objective Reality, Male Reality, and Social Construction,” in Women, Knowledge and Reality, ed. Garry and Pearsall, 84–107. 11  Janet R. Jakobsen and Ann Pellegrini, Love the Sin: Sexual Regulation and the Limits of Religious Freedom (Boston, MA: Beacon, 2003). 12  CEDAW; Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), http://www.ohcHumanRights.org/en/ professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx, UN General Assembly, “Convention on the Rights of the Child,” 20 November 1989, United Nations, Treaty Series 1577: 3.

28   Carole R. Fontaine from the rigid doctrinal control of the Church and its economics from monarchies that left vast swathes of the citizenry in perpetual subjection to aristocracy, are more telling in the formation of the ideas of human worth that underlie human rights approaches than any particular religious sentiment. The legacy of centuries of religious wars, the rise of a mercantile class, and the Industrial Revolution together worked to liberate people from the inheritance of hopeless passivity in the face of authoritarian rule of whatever sort. While religion certainly lent a theological underpinning to that progress, it should not be installed as the sine qua non of a global ethic of worth and dignity, especially given religion’s easy accommodation of its colonial appropriation by the state. Indeed, singling out Western religion, in whatever form, as the key desideratum of human rights approaches is guaranteed to cause some other cultures to reject human rights as a covert attack on their own religious or cultural sources of ethical reflection. At that point, we would argue that it is only by extending the basic ideas formulated in all our diverse inherited global texts, religious and secular, to new classes of people (and beings?)— women, slaves/servants, LGBTQ people, and all others—that human rights discourse can evolve into the more inclusive and flexible set of guidelines that we require.13

The Bible on Women’s Human Rights: Yes, No, or Maybe? As we turn to the Bible on the subject of the worth and dignity of women, we find the particular paradox alluded to above in full operation: the ancient world did not think of individual rights as moderns do, based on the historical developments between then and now. Thus, there is a certain illegitimacy in searching the Bible for a way to support ideas that far postdate the formulation of that text and its interpretations. Furthermore, while the Bible certainly influenced the West’s legal, philosophical, and ethical traditions, it also represents one of the powerful edifices of intersecting ideas from which the West has struggled to free itself, embracing science, ecumenism, and even freedoms from religion as a species of freedom of religion. Should we actually look to “Scripture” to validate both the positive aspects of human rights discourse while acknowledging that human rights roundly trounces and discards far more of the biblical ethical teachings and world view than it retains?

The Nature of the Text The Bible, of course, does not exist in a vacuum; nor will it be treated here as though it dropped out of heaven without human contact or engagement. The societies which created the Bible span at least a millennium and cover various forms of social organization: 13 Ishay, The History of Human Rights, 47.

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   29 tribes, tribal associations, monarchies, colonies, home rule, conquest and deportation, restoration, and full domination by the brutal empire of Rome. Many of the views expressed in the Bible changed over time in response to the changing fortunes of the people and their understandings of how God was active in their national or personal lives. It would be improper to say that there is just one view of anything in the Bible and, for this reason, the communities that hold it sacred must find a way to tolerate, if not welcome, diversity of opinion on very serious matters. Communities must engage in interpretation due to the very nature of the project in which they find themselves involved. Like most religious literature, the Bible holds a unique position in the communities that hold it as an authority—that is, a source by which other sources of knowledge or practice are to be judged. Whatever outsiders and non-believers may think of it, the Bible is claimed to be special, believable, and, in some way, compelling to those who claim it as their own. The Bible as scripture is reflexive in nature. It both creates a community, binding together those who hold it to be true and valuable, and it is continually created by that very community, who adds to the tradition, creating new parts and interpreting what was inherited. The Bible gains its authority in various ways, with different groups emphasizing one approach over another, given their various histories and theologies. In practice, of course, communities of faith and practice tend to view Scripture in overlapping modalities, seldom teasing out the particular ways that it functions as authority in various settings. It is worth noting that the Bible does not consist of only one authorial voice (that of God or Moses), nor does it contain only one kind of writing. Different voices carry different kinds of authority. Prophecy from God, delivered by a prophet claiming to give a divine message as accurately and faithfully as any diplomatic court messenger from a foreign king may carry more weight than a love song attributed to Solomon. An ancestor story or a narrative of a king’s battle may be considered less “binding” in application than a legal text. Similarly, a psalm, which is a human lyric composed for worship of God, might edge out a bawdy folktale about hero Samson’s love life for spiritual value to the believer. Not all texts carry the same authority, so interpretation by the community of readers/hearers is always required.

Reflexive Interpretation The reflexivity principle of the Bible demands that readers do not simply let the text question them; believers are required to question the text as well, and it is in this practice that the norms of human rights thinking about universal human worth and dignity may be introduced. As we shall see below, such considerations are not alien to the Bible. Still, they were never part of the interests of the elites who wished to present their own wishes as reflecting those of their God. We require modern tools, along with biblical ones, to uncover the ancient worth of every body—even that of the enemy, a female child in the womb, or all flesh upon the earth.

30   Carole R. Fontaine

Rights Talk in the Bible Here, we will find that a close reading of the Hebrew Bible text discloses a powerful group ethic that shares much with Islamic, Asian, and socialist values around human rights. Because it comes from antiquity in the Levant, group survival depended largely upon subsistence agriculture. Individual rights and fulfillment simply did not exist in any meaningful way. Each group (usually the extended family or clan) that could not operate cohesively and effectively during the agricultural seasons in a famine-prone region of micro-environments simply would not survive. Most social norms pushed and prodded group members toward a consciousness and set of behaviors designed to ensure collective success. The whole family worked on the group project of existence, understood as a viable and sustainable relationship of population to land and its resources.14 While there were divisions of labor by gender, and later by trades as labor diversified in larger settlements, families were still the major economic units of production. Very young children were educated and minded by mothers, older women relatives, or unmarried girls. Later, boys were taught by their fathers and worked with them, while girls learned from their mothers and worked in groups on domestic projects of childcare, preparing foodstuffs, materials for cloth making, and hoe-agriculture adjacent to living compounds. Both genders’ work was valued, and good workers were celebrated. Families held their tools in common, whether for farming or women’s work. Specialists like potters, midwives, herbalists, carvers, and so on might have particular tools that would have been thought of as “theirs,” but the biggest form of “property” held would be the “fields and flocks” that spelled life, the means of production for the family’s survival. Property rights, the honor which came from managing one’s ancestral “inheritance” successfully, were probably the first and most important form of “rights” that the Bible came to recognize. When it appears, individual property such as Joseph’s “coat of many colors,” a gift from his father to his clear “favorite,” might cause trouble within a domestic group, as Joseph’s brothers’ reactions clearly bear out. From the later Second Temple period when the Jews are under home rule by the Persian empire, the Book of Proverbs emphasizes “property”—its meaning, its management, its foibles, and its origin from God—while much legal material in Leviticus and elsewhere deals with the problems of conflict over land and other forms of property. Given that family property (land, animals, tools, seed) in antiquity was so closely tied to the continued ability to exist in an agricultural society, it is indeed a “human right,” almost on par with the “right to life.” When Micah and Isaiah talk about the rich turning the poor out of their ancestral land, they are talking about human rights violations. It must be noted, as well, that in this matrix of the economies of the patriarchal family in mostly rural subsistence agricultural settings, legally women and their offspring fell into a liminal category. This marginalization had the effect of compromising whatever 14 Ellen F. Davis, Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008).

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   31 individual rights might have been accorded to them, even in a setting in which rights talk has limited valence. This reality is reflected in the corpus of biblical law, and its later interpretation in Judaism, where women find themselves covered by both property law (adultery is a crime against the male owner of the wife) and inheritance law (where the widow’s rights are in the hands of her male relatives). In the making of a marriage, a woman was usually supplied with a dowry of money, animals, or household items by her kin, according to their economic ability to provide; the groom’s family paid a commensurate “bride price” to the bride’s family. This economic exchange favored both families, as dowry formed the nucleus of the household property of the new mating unit, and the bride price acted as the foundation of the dowry for the next girl out of the groom’s ­family to be married. Consent by either young person, but most especially the girl, was not a prerequisite for marriage contracts. Marriage was not a matter of love or compatibility, but of economic exchange for the good of both families in a close-knit community (out-group exogamous marriage removed property from the economic unit and so was discouraged). It is easy to see how the bride and her pre-marital chastity could be considered “property” transferred from family of origin to the groom’s family, and a matter of material, economic concern for both groups. She was a purchase under “warranty” for her virginity, now at the disposal of her new owners’ needs. An investment who needed to “pay off ” daily in terms of virtue, agreeability, and serviceability, her fertility was paramount to her new family hoping for male heirs and male workers to advance the family’s wealth (survival). Females to give in marriage or add to domestic workgroups were not always unwelcome, but a surfeit could cause future inheritance problems. Violation of any of these norms could lead to deadly consequences. Somewhere between a person and a parcel, someone to be given away, used as collateral for debts, inherited, honored or beaten, everything about a woman’s well-being depended on her abilities to birth a son, while maintaining her fidelity, and good name as a wife and mother. Reading the ancestor stories in Genesis through Samuel next to the United Nations report on Women’s Rights and Religion, the sometimes ambivalent behavior of women toward their husbands, co-wives, children, and their own sense of self emerges in greater clarity. In calculating the worth and dignity of women in biblical times, it would be wrong to overlook the native tokens of value that mark females’ functional importance to their family units, and, hence, society, or to assume that women were powerless within their own settings. A woman with no economic resources from her family or no male protector fared far worse in her life prospects, becoming a slave, or worse. A woman with a dowry, her own bank account as it were, had certain rights and restrictions on the use of that money by her future family and could seek redress were she to be divorced in some circumstances. The dowry was a visible, material sign of her worth to her family of origin, and signaled that she was expected to be valued commensurately in her new setting. The Bible regularly praises women who fulfill the patriarchal requirements of their gender roles, and lauds those who fill unlikely, out-of-bounds roles in society as themselves metaphorical “Mothers in Israel” (Judges 4–5). Likewise, barren women become a symbol for uselessness and failure.

32   Carole R. Fontaine

Evaluating the Bible by UN Standards of Female Human Rights Abuses Related to Religion: The WUNRN Study (2002) If philosophy, law, and even modern human rights (so far) have left women and children behind, it must be said that religion, which is generally understood by believers in world populations to be a good and healthy thing for humanity, has seldom done a better job. Substantial variations exist in the details of how the second-class nature of women’s rights and place in the structure of the family in society play out cross-culturally. However, many of the ways that societies justify the curtailment of women’s rights are directly related to (or wrongly imputed to) religious beliefs, traditions, and practices. This justification occurs globally, regardless of whether a nation is secular or religious, recognizes women as equal citizens before the law or not, and across religions—meaning no one religion is exempt from these tendencies; all are offenders to varying degrees. Survey studies undertaken by the United Nations allow us to identify worldwide a number of practices that violate the basic human rights of women, direct and unapologetic assaults on women’s worth and dignity. All these owe their justification to supposed religious teachings, norms, and practices. According to the UN Women’s Report Network Study,15 these are: ideology of male superiority; preference for sons over daughters (and for heterosexuals over other than heterosexual offspring); institutionalized discrimination against women in situations of religious extremism; clothing restrictions; female genital mutilation; traditional birth practices and taboos; practices relating to marriage and its dissolution: child marriage, consent to marriage, dowry, divorce practices, polygamy, abortion and control over family planning, levirate/sororate practices; discrimination in matters of nationality; inability to give legal evidence or testimony; inheritance and independent administration of property; violations of right to life: infanticide, cruelty to widows, honor killings; violations of dignity: prostitution and abuses related to slavery, rape, and sexual abuse; 15  WUNRN Study, E/CN.4/2002/73/Add.2, pp. 25–27. Available at http://www.wunrn.com/ wp-content/uploads/english1.pdf [accessed October 29, 2016].

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   33 social exclusion:   violation of the right to education, bar to political participation, bar to holding office (including religious office), bar to public worship; aggravated discrimination:   sex tourism, persecution of women targeted for their ethnicities or class. It would be depressingly easy to page through the texts of the Bible, Hebrew or Greek, enumerating multiple examples of the abuses called out by the United Nations report of the impact of religion on women. These go largely unobserved or remarked upon by authors, interpreters, and readers. In other words, the wretched situation for women and girls in “Scripture” has become so normalized that it is barely felt, much less addressed head on. Even worse, in many places in the text itself the devaluation of women is presented not just as acceptable, but as the direct will of God as a punishment for some mythic infraction (Gen. 3; 1 Tim.; Ben Sira). This is a position many male interpreters still endorse with ill-concealed approval. A glance at the condition of modern women globally confirms that, in many places, things have changed very little since the biblical religions first appeared. If we find little to praise in overt analysis of the treatment of women there, perhaps more may be said by turning to the theological context of the Bible’s views. This is the maximalist approach extended to reflexive interpretation. We will conclude, then, with what many consider the Bible’s best and most coherent statements on human worth as a countering testimony which awaits full application to the rest of humanity. Our “best” texts lodge the origin of rights for humanity directly within God’s creative impulse and gift of the imago Dei, the Divine Image. Although this is a late post-exilic text, we judge it a good thing: after exile and despair, a new view of what endures was forged out of unbearable suffering. No longer does the creation of Man supersede that of Woman, reversing the observable order; now, male and female come together in “birth order” and worth. In the creation story in Genesis 1, written by elites who had been deported to Babylon in the sixth century bce, the structure from Babylonian myths was reused with a hopeful twist for discouraged exiles. Creation is pronounced “good.” Humanity, made together as male and female, on the same day as other land mammals, is also good, and the final part of the whole creation which causes God to exclaim that it is all “very good” indeed. Beyond that pronouncement, humanity is enjoined to breed (the model was good enough for full production!), to manage and watch over the rest of creation. These special functions, compared to other members of creation, derive from humanity’s special nature, bearing the imago Dei: made in the “image” (tselem) and “likeness” (d’mut) of Elohim. This Israelite generic name for God, derived from Canaanite, exhibits a masculine plural ending. In the original Hebrew, the Elohim speaker in 1:26 uses the pronoun “We” in proposing a creation which is modeled on the Elohim-self. Over the centuries Christian theologians have interpreted plural usage by God as referring to another member of the Trinity (Christ), or the Holy Spirit. Or, perhaps the “We” is a “plural of majesty” although that medieval concept does not appear in ancient Hebrew.

34   Carole R. Fontaine Others take a more grammatical, less Christian approach to avoid the theological scandal of potential female or multiple aspect of a unitary patriarchal god: Elohim may take a legitimate translation of “gods” in Canaanite and elsewhere in the Bible. Perhaps this refers to the “divine court” of godlings and angelic hosts, as male plural endings could routinely be used inclusively to cover female members in a mixed group. Archaeological studies from the twentieth century also gesture toward a divine female in the Creation story, the mother-tree goddess Asherah, known consort of the Canaanite creator god Elohim.16 This makes good sense of the text: speaking to Asherah, his consort, Elohim wants to make mortals in “our likeness and image,” the image of them both, and so the image turns out “male and female.” Although the exact meaning here may be argued, it is clear that the image that accurately reflects Elohim is both female and male. The female human made in Elohim’s image bears the “divine” maker’s mark. If that is the origin of human worth, which confers all dignity, then Woman is most definitively as worthy as Man. The divine image, or imago Dei, whether read archaeologically and literarily as God’s Asherah or left ambiguous, has routinely been cast as the foundation of all doctrines concerning human worth in Judaism. The imago Dei also certainly plays its role in Christianity, although it is subsumed by the importance of Jesus Christ as the first born of a new creation. Humans are not just good on the order of fish in the sea or sun in the sky; humans are in some way fashioned so as to reflect the image of God, and therein is their exemplary position as the crown of Creation forged. The Christian Incarnation underscores this: Jesus as “god” makes clear what human dignity can mean, and it is ­salvific. The Bible is not simply speaking of soil that breeds; it is that the soil has been created to talk, remember, breed, cry, laugh, and pray. That is the divine image at work. Here we come full circle, as we find the crux that causes minimalist human rights discourse to depart from maximalist human rights discourse. Humanity’s superlative worth is not inherent to the human being. The worth and dignity, like our breath, is solely a gift from God, conferred in the generous moment of creation. The position of mortals before God must always be one of total gratitude and unflinching obedience in return for this behest; humans have no rights before God, no claim upon the divine, in this form of thinking. However, other humans have claims that must be honored, for they too have been given God’s image. In Matthew 25, those who aid any member of a suffering group have, in fact, performed that service for Jesus. Honoring fellow humans is a demand that hinges upon understanding that God’s image in them demands it. God is the ultimate guarantor of rights, but human communities must try their best to fashion laws and norms of conduct which give daily witness to their foundation in God’s image recognized upon earth in the person of the neighbor. Behind every human law and order stands God as guarantor of justice to the imago Dei. Although the imago Dei appears in a late text, relatively speaking, one sees the idea at work in much earlier texts as people try to figure out how to live out their lives together. 16 William G. Dever, Did God Have a Wife? Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008).

The Bible and Human Rights from a Feminist Perspective   35

Rejects and Prospects: What Endures? Human rights minimalists are deeply critical of an epistemology of rights that begins by diminishing any intrinsic worth in human life in favor of positing the good in an otherworldly being conferring meaning externally, sometimes rather irrationally. Neither will maximalists ever give assent to any approach to ethics which does not place the creature in necessary submission to its Creator. But in the midst of this impasse, neither religion nor secular philosophy or laws can show any substantive, indisputable reason (other than bias) as to why more than half of humanity should be treated as prey, held in conditions of near-slavery, and subjected to every kind of demeaning abuse known to Man. Social ills can often be defined by their philosophically and culturally constructed relationship to the category “woman”: men held as slaves are denied full moral and social agency as they are treated “like women”; LGBTQ persons muddy the waters of male sexual hegemony, treating men “like women” and allowing women to “act as men”; members of other races are often “feminized” to become undeserving of the full rights accorded to men of dominant races. Beneath any human rights abuse, one is likely to find a female figuration that justifies the practice. We live in a world where religion has no monopoly on misogyny but no remedy for the binary fear that any form of difference signals dangerous deviance from a “natural” male norm, regardless of doctrinal statements to the contrary. When wed to the powers of the state, religion has usually been a willing offender of its own best practices. While countless biblical views still hold sway today as moral guides, much of the modern world has seen its faith in a divine guarantor of law and rights die in the fires of Auschwitz, the bombing of Gaza, and the wreckage of Syria. The sanctity of the divine image has proved no guarantee of humane treatment of the bodies that bear its stamp. What endures is our search for a way to live with one another where all mortals are admitted to be human, knit into one common life on one fragile earth. Promises of a golden life eternal are of profound interest to some parts of Scripture, but beyond the scope of human rights discourse. The struggle for a decent, sustainable life now is the more pressing issue for the pilgrim children of earth who follow the path of human rights, where truths are written in blood as well as words. The Bible has much to say, but it is not the only voice crying out “Wilderness!”

Bibliography Chesler, Phyllis. 2018. A Family Conspiracy: Honor Killing. Nashville, TN: New English Review Press. Feher, Michel, Gaeelle Krikorian, and Yales McKee, eds. Nongovernmental Politics. New York, NY: Zone Books, 2007. Fontaine, Carole  R. With Eyes of Flesh: The Bible, Gender, and Human Rights. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008. Garry, Ann, and Marilyn Pearsall, eds. Women, Knowledge and Reality: Explorations in Feminist Philosophy, second ed. New York, NY: Routledge, 1996.

36   Carole R. Fontaine Hollenbach, David, S. J. The Global Face of Public Faith: Politics, Human Rights, and Christian Ethics. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University, 2003. Ishay, Micheline R. The History of Human Rights from Ancient Times to the Globalization Era, with a New Preface. Berkeley, CA: Univ. of California, 2008. Jakobsen, Janet  R., and Ann Pellegrini. Love the Sin: Sexual Regulation and the Limits of Religious Freedom. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2004. Kao, Grace Y. Grounding Human Rights in a Pluralist World. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University, 2011. Nussbaum, Martha C. Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Nussbaum, Martha C. Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011. Wills, Lawrence M. Not God’s People: Insiders and Outsiders in the Biblical World. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishing, 2008.

chapter 3

Catholic A n drocen tr ic Bibl e Tr a nsl ations as Gl oba l Missiona ry Tool s? Carol J. Dempsey, OP

The Bible has fascinated religious and secular people alike. Catholics consider the Bible to be inspired and authoritative. Together with tradition, it forms the foundation of Catholic theology. Unsurprisingly, then, the Bible is an object of intrigue, comfort, challenge, and controversy. Translators continue to add to its plethora of translations, while also translating the text into countless languages. Other translators continue to revise it from one version and edition to another, always seeking to provide readers with a clearer, more accurate translation closer to the “original texts” or one that makes sense to readers in the target language. Yet no matter how great or how meticulous a translator’s efforts are to produce the best version of the text, no translation is without theological, cultural, gender, racial, and ethnocentric biases. All translations are interpretations, and usually translators are required to follow certain norms or principles of translation. Like many other Christian denominations, the Catholic Church is part of the Bible’s long translation history. Currently, the American Catholic Church plans to publish another edition of its New American Bible. This new edition will feature a revised translation that reflects more closely the Church’s core values. The edition is intended for catechetical study and incorporation into the planned revision of the 1992 Lectionary for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. The production of a revised translation is challenging because, unlike other translations, the Catholic Church’s Bible translation is under the auspices of Vatican officials. This essay discusses the arduous process and principles of translation involved in producing a revised translation for the U.S.-American Catholic Church. The first section

38   Carol J. Dempsey, OP explores the landscape of Bible translations in general. The second section discusses why the United States bishops wish to have a new Bible translation and for what purpose. The third section carefully examines the principles of translation established by the Catholic Church’s Vatican officials, exposing problems and pitfalls of the new translation and its ramifications for the Catholic community. The fourth section assesses whether the new translation serves the Catholic Church in its global missionary endeavors. The conclusion presents two approaches that could help bring the revised translation into the twenty-first century. Although the essay focuses on the translation process of the Bible as a whole, specific comments are geared to the Old Testament, the last of the two testaments currently “under construction.” Finally, this revised Bible translation invites a strong feminist critique because the translation continues to perpetuate discrimination, marginalization, male hegemony, and the imperial power of church and world structures and attitudes that are violent, oppressive, and non-transformative.

Are Bible Translations Contemporary or Moribund? Perusing the Literary Landscape Enjoying a long and rich translation history, the Bible is certainly one of the most popular and controversial books ever written. As of June 2019, the Bible has been translated into 683 languages, with the New Testament appearing in an additional 1,534 languages, and other Bible selections and stories translated into another 1,133 languages.1 In the United States, Bible translations occurred in four waves. The first wave began when America declared its independence from England. In 1663, a Puritan clergyman and missionary named John Eliot produced the first English translation of the Bible on the American continent. Entitled Mamusse Wunneetupanatamwe Up-Biblum God and written in the language of the Massachusetts Algonquin Native Americans, this Bible had two editions (1663 and 1685). Robert Aitken, a Philadelphia printer, produced the first American-printed English language New Testament (1777) and then the entire Bible (1782). Thus began the production of English-language Bibles in the United States that reached a high point with the printing of the English version of the Protestant King James Bible (KJV) in 1782. The Catholic Douay-Rheims Challoner version, published by Matthew Carey (1790), followed. Translated from the Latin Vulgate, this Catholic version received approval from the Catholic Church hierarchy and served as the Catholic Bible well into the twentieth century.

1  The Wycliffe Global Alliance, a community of more than one hundred diverse organizations and networks working together in Bible translation movements throughout the world, has provided these statistics. See http://wycliffe.net/statistics.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   39 The second wave occurred between the 1820s and the 1870s. This time period saw the American Bible Society take shape. The ABS churned out millions of copies of the KJV whose English translation became designated as “formal equivalence.”2 During the third wave from the 1870s to the 1980s, English-language Bible translations flourished. Literalist interpretations of the Bible and literal translations attracted much attention and interest. It gave birth to the Fundamentalist Movement, started by a group of literalist, interdenominational Protestants in the early twentieth century. Six prominent American Bible translations came into existence: the American Standard Version (ASV, 1901);3 the Revised Standard Version (RSV, 1952);4 Today’s English Version (TEV, 1966);5 the New American Bible (NAB, 1970);6 The Living Bible (TLB, 1971);7 and the New International Version (NIV, 1978).8 The ASV, RSV, and NAB were formal equivalence translations. The TEV was a dynamic equivalence translation;9 the NIV combined elements of both formal and dynamic equivalence. During this third wave, many revisions of these translations were produced. For instance, the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV, 1989), a revision of the RSV, gave some attention to inclusive language.10 The fourth wave began in the late 1980s and continues into the twenty-first century. This wave offered several new inclusive Bible translations in English11 that followed 2  The literal or formal equivalence approach emphasizes a word-for-word translation of the biblical text. In her discussion on Bible translations, Susanne Scholz notes that “the Protestant-Reformation insisted on the idea that Bible translations are literalist-linguistic achievements transforming the original Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek texts into formal equivalents in manifold target languages.” See Susanne Scholz, The Bible as Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2017), 301. 3  The ASV (or otherwise known as the Revised Version, Standard American Edition) is a revision of the 1885 British version of the revised KJV, the RV. The ASV is almost identical to the 1885 Revised Version. The ASV became the basis for hundreds of later revisions, some of which include the RSV. 4  The RSV is a revision of the ASV. The original Catholic Edition of the RSV was published in 1966. The RSV also became the basis for the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV, 1989) and the English Standard Version (ESV, 2001). The Catholic Edition of the NRSV was published in 2006. 5  The TEV is also called the Good News Bible (GNB). In 1992, the translation was revised to use some inclusive language, though the masculine pronouns for “God” and the term “Lord” remained unchanged. 6  The NAB used original biblical languages for its translation. 7  TLB is an English paraphrase of the ASV. 8  The NIV translators used the highest quality available biblical manuscripts written in the original biblical languages. 9  Functional or dynamic equivalence approach emphasizes translating the Hebrew texts thought for thought and not word for word. Focus is on readers’ sensibilities instead of text translation accuracy. 10  The NRSV, REB, and NJB all have some sensitivity to inclusive language, but in general they retain the masculine pronouns for “God” (see, e.g., Psalms 136, 147) as well as such terms like “Lord” and “King” for the Divine (see, e.g., Psalm 145). 11  See, e.g., Joe Dearborn, Mark Buckley, and Craig R. Smith: Priests for Equality, The Inclusive Bible: The First Egalitarian Translation (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007); The New Testament and Psalms: An Inclusive Version (1995); The New International Version: Inclusive Language Edition (NIVI, 1996); and The Contemporary Torah: A Gender-Sensitive Adaption of the JPS Translation (2006). The Common English Bible (2013) employs dynamic equivalence and aims to make use of inclusive language, but the translation falls short on creating alternatives to the texts’ God-language and thus continues to use such kyriarchal terms as “Lord” for the Divine.

40   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Lawrence Venuti’s foreignization strategy. It aims at challenging the status quo of the target-language society and the hegemonic norms in the target-language context.12 One example for this strategy is The Inclusive Bible: The First Egalitarian Translation (2007).13 This dynamic equivalence translation, presenting different ways of speaking about God, such as “Almighty” or “Sovereign One” instead of “Father” and “Lord,” eliminates sexist vocabulary. The translation also recovers women’s active participation in salvation history. For example, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are referenced with their female counterparts, Sarah, Rebecca, Leah, and Rachel, although Hagar, Bilhah, and Zilpah are omitted. Thus, this translation addresses discriminatory and male-centered ways of thinking in order to present readers with a transformative translation. During the fourth wave, the Catholic New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE) took final shape in 2010 and was published in 2011. This new revision is the culmination of nearly twenty years of work by a group of nearly one hundred scholars and theologians, including bishops, revisers, and editors. A revision of the original New American Bible (NAB), this formal-equivalence translation mostly follows the 1989 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) by also incorporating more inclusive language than the NAB. The New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE) includes a fully revised Old Testament, a revision of the 1986 revision of the New American Bible (NAB) psalms, and the 1986 revision of the New Testament. The first 1986 revision of the original NAB psalms translation was highly controversial among Catholic officials because of its inclusive language that did not conform with the Vatican’s guidelines for liturgical translations. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) sponsors both the NAB and the NABRE. This Conference, in conjunction with various other Vatican agencies, makes the final decisions on the acceptability of translations with Catholic doctrine. Of utmost concern among the bishops is the preservation of male language for God, as it pertains to pronouns and imagery. Both the NAB and NABRE also include extensive explanatory notes that provide readers with background discussions and doctrinal principles. Thus, both religious and market interests are the driving forces behind many American Bible translations. The question remains if any of these Bibles and their respective translations are contemporary or moribund. The perusal of the literary landscape suggests that some Bible translations are contemporary and transformational while others are moribund and out of touch with American thought and language patterns. The issues, however, are much deeper than language. If the Catholic Bible is to be a translation for the twenty-first century that is not only transformative but also responsive to the Church’s global mission, deeper changes need to occur beyond translation revisions. The following section discusses the next translation revision of the already revised edition of the New American Bible (NABRE). 12  For further discussion on this strategy, see Susanne Scholz, “The Scandal of Inclusive Bible Translations: Foreignizing the Bible,” Celebration Publications (April 2019): 3–5; Scholz, The Bible as Political Artifact, 302–4. 13  Joe Dearborn, Mark Buckley, and Craig R. Smith: Priests for Equality, The Inclusive Bible: The First Egalitarian Translation (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2007).

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   41

Why the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Favors Another Bible Translation Several reasons exist as to why the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops plans to publish a revised translation of the NABRE. First, the bishops wish to have a new revision. The Conference of Bishops is the governing body for the entire Catholic Church in the United States, having full authority to request and initiate a revision regardless of the Catholic laity’s preferences. As part of a larger hierarchical, all-male ordained, and ecclesiastical structure headquartered in Vatican City within Rome, the Conference of Bishops collaborates with Vatican officials who approve the mandates and practices of the Conference. Although several models of “church” exist,14 Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI embraced the institutional model for the Church. This model presents the church as doctrinal, hierarchical, patriarchal, kyriarchal, and clerical. Many United States church officials appointed prior to Pope Francis fit this model of church. This institutional model insists on the authority of the office holders whose task is to guide, teach, and sanctify. The model gives power to the United States bishops. In turn, the bishops draw their authority from this model. Hence, if the bishops wish to have a new revision of the NABRE translation, then the NABRE translation will be revised again. Second, in line with Vatican II’s mandate to revise the liturgical texts to ensure that full and active participation becomes the normative practice, the bishops are planning a revision of the two main books that Catholics use for their liturgies, namely, the 1992 Lectionary for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. The bishops would like to have the same wording for the translation of the biblical texts to be included in these two projects. In this sense, then, the revision of the NABRE’s translation has mainly a liturgical purpose and will be a liturgical translation. Third, Vatican officials have not approved the NABRE translation for incorporation into the Lectionary for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours because of some of the NABRE’s inclusive language and other translation word choices. Hence, the bishops need a translation that can receive Vatican approval for use in the upcoming revised editions of the Church’s two liturgical books. History bears out that the Conference of Bishops and Vatican officials argued for several years about the various revised translation editions of the NAB and which edition was suitable for inclusion in the lectionary. Bible scholars, bishops, and Vatican officials entered into heated debates, with the liveliest one being over the 1986 NAB inclusive language psalter translation. Neither the team of Bible scholars nor the United States bishops could get Vatican officials to approve the translation for inclusion in the lectionary. Finally, a small delegation of bishops and Vatican officials met together in Rome and worked on further translation revisions to the NAB revised 14  For the classic post–Vatican II work on this topic, see Avery Dulles, Models of the Church (New York, NY: Random House, 1978).

42   Carol J. Dempsey, OP psalter. They removed the inclusive language in many psalms. Their efforts led to the approval of the 1992 revised Lectionary for Mass. This lectionary included the 1970 NAB Old Testament translations, the revisions to the 1986 NAB revised psalter, and the 1986 NAB New Testament translations. Of note, the bishops suggested that the NRSV texts could be a possible other option for the revised lectionary readings, but Vatican officials concluded that this translation was also “unsuitable” for liturgical purposes because of its inclusive language and its translation of ‘almâ as “young woman” instead of “virgin” in Isa 7:14. Fourth, the revised translation needs to embrace the vision and directives of the Council for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy that states: The purpose of liturgical translations is to proclaim the message of salvation to believers and to express the prayer of the church to the Lord. . . . To achieve this end, it is not sufficient that a liturgical translation merely reproduce the expressions and ideas of the original text. Rather it must faithfully communicate to a given people, and in their own language, that which the Church by means of this given text originally intended to communicate to another people ‘in another time’. A faithful translation, therefore, cannot be judged on the basis of individual words: the total context of this specific act of communication must be kept in mind, as well as the literary form proper to the respective language.15

This statement offers some latitude for Bible translations when it acknowledges that “it is not sufficient that a liturgical translation merely reproduce the expressions and ideas of the original text . . . .” Furthermore, the point that liturgical translations “must faithfully communicate to a given people, and in their own language . . .” calls translators to take into account the social location and economic, gender, ecological, anthropological, and psychological context of the community reading the text. Yet the statement also imposes doctrinal constraints for translations that have affected past translations of NAB texts, including the NABRE translation. Whether or not Bible scholars working on the translation committee will be able to implement dynamic language that speaks to the community’s context is undetermined. Fifth, the bishops are hoping that this new revised translation will lead to a new edition of the NABRE. The new revised translation will be the official Bible for Catholics16 15  See International Commission on English in the Liturgy, “Instruction Comme le prevoit: On the Translation of Liturgical Texts for Celebration with a Congregation, 25 January 1969,” in Documents on the Liturgy: 1963–1979 (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1982), 843. This Commission that wrote the aforementioned document was established in 1969 whose charge was the implementation of the Constitution on the Liturgy, one of the Vatican II documents. 16  In her early work, Catholic Bible scholar Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza describes the Bible paradigms as doctrinal, historical, and pastoral-theological; see Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Bread Not Stone: The Challenge of Feminist Biblical Interpretation (Boston, MA: Beacon, 1984), 23–42. The new revised Bible translation, as directed by the bishops, will safeguard and promote the doctrinal and historical paradigms of the Bible with little or no regard for the pastoral-theological paradigm. The latter paradigm speaks to the diverse and marginalized Catholic population, the people of God, that will receive the newly revised translation.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   43 and will be suitable for catechesis and study. The explicit goal is for Catholics to read, study, pray, and hear the proclaimed “Word of God” in the same translation so that the laity will not be confused. The implicit goal, however, seems to be the desire to keep Catholics colonized, indoctrinated, and acculturated in the present culture of the clerical, hierarchical, patriarchal, sexist, heteronormative-supporting, racist, classist, and ethnocentric institutional Church whose “Church Fathers” have helped shape its doctrines and tradition. The tradition, meant to be a living and ongoing one of which the Church Fathers are only a small part, remains frozen in time. The current male church officials thus leave both the Bible and the Catholic tradition stuck in worldviews that cease to make sense to many twenty-first-century Catholics. In sum, for these five reasons, the bishops would like to have a revision of the NABRE. The important question that surfaces is this one: To whom does this new Bible translation belong? The relevance of this question is conditioned on the fact that the United States Church is culturally and linguistically pluralistic. Having a uniform translation goes against the liturgical principle of full and active participation.

Whose Bible Is the New Revised Translation Anyway? Negotiating the Translation Principles Without a doubt, the NAB’s history and its connection to the Lectionary for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours indicates that a revised translation of the NABRE will have the United States Catholic Bishops and church documents shaping the conversation. Thus, the revised translation will enjoy the Vatican’s approval. To accomplish the translation revision task, the Bishops’ Conference established an editorial board of Old Testament and New Testament Bible scholars and a team of revisers to work with the editorial board. The revisers do not have to be Catholic, but they do need to belong to the Catholic Biblical Association of America. The bishops vetted every single scholar who is a part of this project. The chair of the bishops’ subcommittee on the Translation of Scripture Texts and the Executive Director of the Secretariat of Doctrine and Canonical Affairs—a priest—of the Bishops’ Conference will oversee the project. The Old Testament section of the editorial board consists of three male and two female scholars. Altogether, the board and Conference representatives consist of five ordained and three non-ordained members. Having two female scholars on the board does not make it “inclusive.” Any scholar who believes so is a neoliberal feminist.17 17  For an excellent discussion on neoliberal feminism, see Esther Fuchs, “Reclaiming the Hebrew Bible for Women: The Neoliberal Turn in Contemporary Feminist Scholarship,” JFSR 24.2 (2008): 45–65; see also one of her latest works: Esther Fuchs, Feminist Theory and the Bible: Interrogating the Sources (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2016).

44   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Additionally, the translation board is all white; it does not represent the races, classes, cultures, and ethnicities of the Catholic population in the United States who will receive this new translation. Thus, with the exception of the two females, the basic composition of the board reflects the institutional male white Church. Moreover, the translation proc­ess and the translation guidelines attest to the Church’s patriarchal and kyriarchal nature and attitudes asserted through its officials on this translation project. One further note, the power cards seem to be stacked against the three nonordained members of the board. The two non-ordained female scholars and the one non-ordained male scholar could easily become marginalized because none of them are ordained in the church’s hierarchical structure. How much of a deliberative role will the editorial board have? The answer is not yet known. How much influence will the two female scholars have? The effect is yet to be determined, but their thought must be part of the conversation and their voices must be heard. The translation committee has invited them to the table, and they will address what needs to be addressed and speak truth to power in whatever ways possible. Guided by the Church documents Liturgiam authenticam, Divino Afflante Spiritu, Sacrosanctum Concilium, Dei Verbum, Verbum Domini, The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church, and the Jewish People and Their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible,18 the Old Testament editors drew up a set of translation revision principles that the bishops approved. The principles for the revised translation are clear: first, a formal equivalence translation from the “original texts”; second, a word choice “more literal and faithful to the original texts,” i.e., “one like a son of man” and not “one like a human being,” “virgin” and not “young woman,” among other words and phrases; third, inclusive language used sparingly while retaining gender-specific language, pronouns, and metaphors for God; and fourth, a translation faithful to the dogmatic and doctrinal teachings of Catholicism that shows the interrelatedness of the two testaments and intertestamental congruity when Old Testament phrases having implications for the New Testament are rendered in a specific way. Several issues stand out with respect to the translation revision principles. The first issue concerns the translation approach. A formal equivalence translation allows the Church hierarchy to remain closed to new twentieth- and twenty-first-century advances in Bible translation theory. R. S. Sugirtharajah makes the case that “[t]he Bible translations in the colonial period introduced such virtues as accuracy, authenticity, and being true to original texts . . . .”19 A formal equivalence translation allows the bishops to return to a sixteenth-century, post-Reformation, Protestant model that is text-centered and not reader-centered. Since for Catholics the final interpreters of Scripture are, when doubt exists, the Church’s hierarchy, having a translation supportive and protective of the institution and its power structure and mindset seems to be important to the 18  For the specific documents, see the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. 19  R. S. Sugirtharajah, “Textual Cleansing: A Move from the Colonial to the Postcolonial Version,” in Race, Class, and Politics of Bible Translation, ed. Randall C. Bailey and Tina Pippin (Semeia 76; Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 1996), 12.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   45 bishops, as historical evidence demonstrates. A formal equivalence translation keeps the teaching, ruling, and sanctifying power of the Catholic Church in the hands of its ordained male hierarchy. This type of translation sustains the hierarchy’s control over the laity, keeps Catholics colonized to a way of thinking and believing, and allows “the Word of God” to continue contributing to the nation’s and world’s systemic androcentrism and related patriarchy and kyriarchy. Androcentrism, patriarchy, and kyriarchy are made “holy and acceptable” by many of the Bible’s words, phrases, references, stories, and poems that are shining examples of violence, hatred, bigotry, racism, sexism, and abuse. These situations are especially exacerbated when God’s inspired Word is prayed and proclaimed in and during sacred services. No finer way exists than Catholic sacred services to acculturate the laity into the male, white, and Western hegemony of church and world. The second issue concerns a “literal translation.” According to Catholic Bible scholar Gerard S. Sloyan a “literal translation” does not exist.20 All translations involve words that do not have meanings by themselves because readers assign meanings to them. Meanings are “codetermined by their relationships to other words and sentences, which form their context.”21 Bible words are alphabetized and classified in Bible dictionaries and lexica, which are the fruits of the male, elite, Western intellectual tradition. In no way, then, do Bible dictionaries and lexicons aid in understanding the original texts of the Bible in their historical or cultural contexts.22 Thus, all translations, including the new translation of the Catholic Bible, are interpretations of words with meanings ascribed to them. No interpretation is without theological, cultural, gender, racial, and ethnocentric biases that continue to perpetrate systemic injustice today. In short, every translation violates. The third issue concerns the sparse use of inclusive language. Language is dynamic and has power. It reflects culture and shapes religious beliefs. Language also excludes. By allowing exclusive language to dominate the Church’s cornerstone document, namely its Scriptures, bishops and other Vatican officials continue to perpetuate male hegemony 20  See Gerard S. Sloyan, “Some Thoughts on the Bible,” Worship 75 (2001): 235. For further discussion on this myth of literal translations, see also Caroline Vander Stichele, “Murder She Wrote or Why Translation Matters: A Response to Mary Phil Korsak’s ‘Translating the Bible,’ ” in Bible Translation on the Threshold of the Twenty-first Century, ed. Athalya Brenner and Jan Willem van Henten (JSOTSupp 353; New York, NY: Sheffield Academic Press Ltd, 2002), 147–55. 21  Jeremy Punt, “Translating the Bible in South Africa: Challenges to Responsibility and Contextuality,” in ibid., 95. 22  On the intersection of language, power, and the formation of dictionaries, see Letty M. Russell, “Inclusive Language and Power,” Religious Education 80.4 (Fall 1985): 582–602. She argues that language, dictionaries, and power are interrelated, and that society’s elite set the norms for language and control the resources for education and communication. To expose cultural imperialism and the biases of translators and lexicons, see Johnson Kiriaku Kinyua, “A Postcolonial Analysis of Bible Translation and Its Effectiveness in Shaping and Enhancing the Discourse of Colonialism and the Discourse of Resistance: The Gikuyu New Testament—A Case Study,” Black Theology 112.1 (2013): 58–95. He explains on p. 85: “[B]efore the writing happens, the translator will look for lexical equivalence of the source text in the targeted language. If the targeted language lacks convincing lexical equivalence, the translator will either borrow from elsewhere or create his or her own lexicon.”

46   Carol J. Dempsey, OP and the marginalization of women in the church. Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite rightly argues that “inclusive language is born in the struggle of those who are linguistically invisible as they come to the recognition that their linguistic invisibility reflects and perpetuates the exclusivist bias of the institutions of their society.”23 Catholic women living on the margins today and choosing to stay within the Catholic Church institutional structure will find Thistlethwaite’s point extremely challenging because they have neither the power nor the influence to effect change in the Church’s core documents that could be a source of institutional transformation. The new translation of the Catholic Bible is a classic example. Moreover, many faithful Catholics in the United States are still tuning in to the television show “Father Knows Best,” hearing the show’s scripts being aired during the Church’s Eucharistic liturgies in particular. Non-inclusive language marginalizes and discriminates against diversity. It is not acceptable for God’s people who are “church.” The fourth issue concerns non-inclusive language for the Divine. Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza argues boldly: The writings of the Hebrew Bible use the imperial languages of Near Eastern empires, whereas those of the Christian Testament are imbued with Roman imperial language. In the context of medieval feudal system, Christian the*logy celebrated G*d the Father as an all-powerful king and an omniscient ruler of the universe.24 The absolute power of G*d has legitimated the power of princes and overlords, of bishops and popes, of fathers and husbands, of Christian mission and colonization.25

Satoko Yamaguchi takes Schüssler Fiorenza’s point a step further, maintaining: We need to expand inclusive language for G*d to the dimensions of ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and further particularities of human embodiment, all of which are created in the image of G*d. Such an action is meant not to valorize all the diversity engendered by kyriarchal oppression but to see the image of G*d embodied in each person, even in a variety of exploited or distorted situations, so that we can clearly see our structural sins, which are against G*d’s creation. We need to expand as well our divine language to include various dimensions of the entire cosmos that may also be reflections of the image of G*d. Our divine kyriarchy will be  gradually dismantled only with our conscious use of such multidimensional inclusive language.26

23  Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, “Inclusive Language: Theoretical and Philosophical Fragments,” Religious Education 80.4 (Fall 1985): 558. 24  Here Schüssler Fiorenza draws on the thought of Brian Wren, What Language Shall I Borrow? God-Talk in Worship: A Male Response to Feminist Theology (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1989), 119. 25  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, The Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007), 207. 26  Satoko Yamaguchi, “Father Image of G*d and Inclusive Language,” in Toward a New Heaven and a New Earth, ed. Fernando F. Segovia (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2003), 215.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   47 Clearly, Yamaguchi pushes the boundaries of language beyond androcentric and even anthropocentric inclusivity. Together, Schüssler Fiorenza’s and Yamaguchi’s comments uncover two points relative to the planned new edition of the Catholic New American Bible with its revised translation. Most importantly, the insistence of the bishops and Vatican officials on noninclusive language for the Divine perpetuates the patriarchal and kyriarchal governing structures that legitimate their own power and authority. In addition, the insistence on a male deity and its many male attributes, especially the warrior image (Exod. 15:3) that lops off peoples and nations and even punishes non-human life, reveals how deeply ingrained the male hierarchical Church is in its own androcentric culture, as it intersects with anthropocentrism. Through this intersection, male becomes the dominant gender of humanity. Moreover, the male metaphors for God have shaped and will continue to shape not only Catholic theology and ethics but also the Church’s policies, doctrines, dogmas, and ultimately, most of its ruling body’s self-understanding, attitudes, and actions. Such metaphors have also shaped Catholic belief and Catholic religious imagination. Embedded in many Catholic texts and prayers are images of God derived from the Old Testament. Among them are God the “father” (e.g., Jer. 3:4, 19, 31), “Lord” (e.g., Exod. 20:2; 34:6; Ps. 106:48), “king” (Prov. 24:21; Isa. 44:6), the avenging “warrior” (Exod. 15:3; Isa. 42:13), the heavenly “monarch” (Isa. 6:1–8), and the “husband” of Israel (Isa. 54:5). All of these metaphors promote patriarchy, kyriarchy, violence, and heteronormatism, attitudes and systems of thought so characteristic of many Church officials today. The fifth issue concerns certain common words and phrases shared between the Old Testament and the New Testament. For the bishops to follow Liturgiam authenticam and Vatican officials to insist on a translation that shows the interrelatedness of the two testaments, especially when Old Testament phrases are translated in a way that supports the doctrinal statements of the New Testament, such as “son of man” (Dan. 7:13; Matt. 20:18) and “virgin” (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23), is to “Christianize” the Old Testament. This “Christianizing” of the Old Testament will produce a “Catholic” Bible that strongly supports Catholic doctrine within both testaments. Yet this type of Bible promotes supersessionism, the mark of the colonizing church. The “new evangelization,” a movement started by Pope John Paul II and continued with Benedict XVI, illustrates colonization that takes place by proselytizing for the purpose of converting people to Christianity as the One True Faith, with Jesus Christ proclaimed as the only Lord and Savior and the only way to God.27 The move to Christianize the Bible thus seems to be part of a larger renewal effort among some church officials who continue to embrace the vision of the previous two popes. In sum, does room exist for negotiating the specific translation guidelines? The current evidence suggests a negative answer. Furthermore, the present institutional model of ‘the Church’, whose doctrinal teaching about the Trinity makes inclusive God-language 27  See the Vatican document Dominus Iesus: On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church, available on the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

48   Carol J. Dempsey, OP impossible, whose foundational and “indispensable” method for translating and interpreting its Scriptures has been historical critical, whose governing officials will not cede their gendered positions of power for a more inclusive church, whose tradition prioritizes the teaching of Church Fathers, and whose pre–Vatican II narrow missionary activity has been focused on proselytization instead of liberating evangelization, does not set the tone for substantive translation changes. The Catholic Church has many wonderful documents, but its praxis does not support the breadth, depth, and vision of its documents.

Laying Bare the Discrepancy between the Catholic Church’s Global Missionary Goals and Its New Edition of the Bible to Be Studied and Proclaimed Whether the new edition of the New American Bible with its revised translation will be a global missionary tool for the Catholic Church must be determined in the context of the vision of Vatican II. One of the Vatican II documents that deals with the missionary activity of the Church is Ad Gentes where “the church declared itself in solidarity with the whole human family and defined its mission in terms of service.”28 Building on the spirit of Vatican II, the latest papal Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium, outlines a broader vision for church and mission. The current Pope Francis authored this Apostolic Exhortation. According to this document, the Church is not to be concerned with “being at the centre” (EG #49).29 Its focus is to be on the care for people and not for the institution. Church leaders are to be in solidarity with God’s people and not stand in solidarity with political rulers that exercise power and domination over the people of God. On this point, Andrea Riccardi observes that “Pope Francis does not believe in the church’s hegemony over society. . . . To his way of thinking, the success of such hegemonies is weak and merely apparent.”30 For Francis, “being Church means being God’s people . . .” (EG #114).31

28 Timothy G. McCarthy, The Catholic Tradition: Before and after Vatican II 1878–1993 (Chicago, IL: Loyola Press, 1994), 84. 29  See the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops’ website for the entire text of Evangelii Gaudium. 30  Andrea Riccardi, To the Margins: Pope Francis and the Mission of the Church (trans. Dinah Livingstone; Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018), 19. 31  Evangelii Gaudium.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   49 Evangelii Gaudium goes on to state that if the Church takes up its missionary impulse, it has to reach everyone, especially the despised and overlooked (EG #48).32 “The Church must be a place of mercy freely given, where everyone can feel welcomed, loved, forgiven and encouraged to live the good life of the Gospel” (EG #114).33 Living out the Gospel is to take precedence over a personal and private relationship with God (EG #180).34 Evangelization is not proselytizing35 and is “the task of the Church. The Church, as the agent of evangelization, is more than an organic and hierarchical institution; she is first and foremost a people advancing on its pilgrim way to God” (EG #111).36 Evangelii Gaudium also makes clear that the Church is called to go to the margins, not only defined geographically but also in human terms. As a “community of people” and as “the People of God” (EG #115),37 the Church is to celebrate and support cultural diversity. Furthermore, within Evangelii Gaudium, the document stresses that “the People of God is incarnate in the peoples of the earth, each with its own culture” (EG #115).38 Thus, cultural diversity is not a threat to Church unity, and the revealed message of the Gospel is transcultural. In concert with the spirit and focus of church and mission as Evangelii Gaudium articulates, the United States bishops have issued a number of pastoral letters that address cultural diversity in the American Catholic Church. One of these pastorals addresses racism,39 and another letter elaborates on the pastoral needs of Asian and Pacific Island communities.40 The bishops have also produced a new study on cultural diversity that displays the Catholic Church’s growing multicultural population. Nowadays, more than 6,300 U.S. parishes serve distinct ethnic and cultural groups.41 As a whole, the Catholic Church contains a rich deposit of documents that pertain to Catholic Social Teaching.42 They emphasize the option for the poor and vulnerable and stress that God’s people are one human family, despite and in harmony with national, racial, ethnic, economic, and ideological differences, or the care for God’s creation. Thus, the Church and its mission is meant to be broad and people-centered, committed to justice, and called to stand in solidarity with all creation. After perusing the broader understanding of Church and the landscape of its global mission, one can draw the conclusion that the revision of the New American Bible Revised Edition, with its translation principles mired in Western hegemony, and with its androcentric, discriminatory, and marginalizing language, perspectives, and content, will not be a global missionary tool for the proclamation of the Gospel which has justice 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. 34  Evangelii Gaudium. 35  “Message of Pope Francis for World Mission Day 2013.” 36  Evangelii Gaudium. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid. 39 See Open Wide Our Hearts: The Enduring Call to Love—A Pastoral Letter against Racism; the full text can be viewed on the United States Catholic Bishops’ website. 40 See Encountering Christ in Harmony: A Pastoral Response to Our Asian and Pacific Island Brothers and Sisters. The full text appears on the website of the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops. 41  See the United States Catholic Bishops’ website for the full text of the study. 42  For the foundational documents on Catholic Social Teaching, see the website of the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops. Also see John A. Coleman and William F. Ryan, eds., Globalization and Catholic Social Thought (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2005).

50   Carol J. Dempsey, OP as the constitutive element of its message. If the new edition of the Bible is to be a book for the global twenty-first century, then deeper changes need to take place in addition to translation revision.

Moving the Catholic Bible Translation into the Global Twenty-First Century: Concluding Comments For the new edition of the New American Bible Revised (NABRE) to move into the twenty-first century and to become the book of the people instead of the hierarchical church, the text itself must undergo deeper revisions other than those outlined in the principles of translation. If not, the new edition with its refreshed translation will be moribund before it is even printed. A modest approach to change this scenario is to have translators and revisers of the NABRE’s text use inclusive language liberally and especially for references to the Divine. Translators and revisers also need to go through every single text and eliminate any words or phrases that are anti-Jewish, sexist, racist, heteronormative, ethnocentric, ageist, classist, ableist, and otherwise discriminatory. Explanatory notes need to be extensive and demonstrate a reading of the text that goes against the grain. Preachers need to preach against the grain of the text instead of applying the text to daily life. An inclusive approach to change the scenario is to decolonize completely the Bible from its Eurocentric and Catholic male cultures that have controlled its translations and the way the stories and poems are presented and told. All of the stories and poems need to be re-written from the perspective of all those who are on the margins. All language needs to be inclusive, especially for the Divine. Androcentric and heteronormative metaphors need to be replaced with inclusive ones. Non-dominant “voices” need to temper dominant ones, and silent ones need to be heard. All discriminatory, ethnocentric, racist, and sexist language needs to be eliminated, and women need to be “un-essentialized” and freed from the portraits male authors have given them. In making these changes, Bible translators and revisers begin to create a new tradition, one that is much needed in the twenty-first-century church. As Caroline Vander Stichele states: “What then can a feminist translator do? What is it that she wants to do? In my view, she can make a ­difference—not so much in telling a different story, as in telling the story differently.”43 In order for the above changes to happen, the translation editorial board and team of revisers need to be reconfigured so that diversity, inclusion, and intellectual openness and creativity are the order of the day. The current editorial board of both Testaments consists of eight ordained and five non-ordained members. Of these members, ten are male and three are female. All are white, with the exception of one Latino. These present 43  Vander Stichele, “Murder She Wrote of Why Translation Matters,” 155.

Catholic Androcentric Bible Translations   51 statistics do not speak to the demographic realities of the church for whom the new edition of the Bible is intended. Furthermore, Catholic doctrines and dogmas need to be critiqued within the complex hermeneutic dynamism operating in the global context. Meanings are dynamic. They are not static, and they are culturally conditioned. The doctrinal but metaphorical language for the Trinity needs to change so “Father” and “Lord” in both the Old Testament and New Testament can be revised to become more inclusive and less kyriarchal. Additionally, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ model of church needs to shift from institution to community, which includes all creation. Substantial education, which did not occur after Vatican II, needs to take place for the whole Church. Everyone needs to wake up to the world around them to see how the Bible has been shaped by cultures and to recognize how the Bible with its hegemonic, sexist, class­ ist, racist, ableist, hierarchical, patriarchal, and gender discriminatory contents contributes to the injustices in the contemporary globalized world. Catholics need to be in dialogue with scholars and members of other faith traditions so that God’s community can learn together. Finally, the Vatican’s tight control on the Catholic intellectual life and the work of its scholars needs to be loosed. If some of these ideas are implemented, and the people of God are well educated to be open enough to receive the translation changes and content revisions, then perhaps the Catholic Church will have a new edition of the Bible, ready to be incorporated into the Lectionary for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. Then perhaps God’s people and all creation can celebrate and proclaim with joy this new word that can become trans­ form­a­tive, propelling the Church ever more deeply into its global mission of justice for all. And maybe then the church will have “the Word of God” and not its present “word of man.” After all, the task of feminists is to change structures and not just to revise words.

Bibliography Bailey, Randall C., and Tina Pippin, eds. Race, Class, and Politics of Bible Translation. Semeia 76. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 1996. Brenner, Athalya, and Jan Willem van Henten, eds. Bible Translation on the Threshold of the Twenty-first Century. JSOTSupp 353. New York, NY: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002. Dube, Musa  W., and R.  S.  Wafula, eds. Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible in Africa. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017. Fuchs, Esther. Feminist Theory and the Bible. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2016. Gutjahr, Paul C., ed. The Handbook of the Bible and Translation in America. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017. Kee, Howard Clark, ed. The Bible in the Twenty-first Century. Philadelphia, PA: Trinity Press International, 1993. Mannion, Gerard, ed. Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Riccardi, Andrea. To the Margins: Pope Francis and the Mission of the Church. Trans. Dinah Livingstone. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018.

52   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Scholz, Susanne. The Bible as Political Artifact: On the Feminist Study of the Hebrew Bible. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2017. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. The Power of the Word: Scripture and the Rhetoric of Empire. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007. Segovia, Fernando  F., ed. Toward a New Heaven and a New Earth. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2003.

chapter 4

The Ch a l l enge of Femi n ist Bibl e Tr a nsl ations i n A fr ica n Con texts Dora R. Mbuwayesango

Colonial Bible translations into African languages have violated indigenous African cultures and religions for centuries. Even worse, colonial Bible translations have not only attempted to obliterate African cultures and religions, but they also imposed Western patriarchal notions about gender that negatively impacted African women and their socio-political status in their societies. Since colonial translations reinforced Western notions about Western colonial supremacy, they contributed to the dispossession of Africans and their land, culture, and dignity. Western missionaries produced the colonial translations that assaulted African cultures and proclaimed Western patriarchal ideology as inherent in biblical teaching. The translations thus ensured that African women experienced increased sexist oppression and marginalization even within their indigenous African cultures. During the past few decades, postcolonial revisions of colonial Bible translations tried to correct the extensive imperial biases that were produced during the active colonial period. For instance, the translation of Badimo (ancestors) for “demons” in the Setswana Bible was changed. Yet explicit and implicit sexist translations in African Bibles that have led to African women’s exclusion and marginalization are still part of many official translation projects in many African contexts because most African Bible translation projects are still male-dominated. They ignore feminist challenges to androcentric language and patriarchal images, and they exclude women translators on a regular basis. This essay calls African Bible translators to remedy the sexist and patriarchal conventions that continue to plague Bible translations even in African postcolonial contexts. It demands that African Bible translators stop using translations as a patriarchal weapon

54   Dora R. Mbuwayesango to oppress and marginalize women in all spheres of African society, including in the political, economic, social, and religious life. The good news is that female and some male Bible scholars have begun to challenge the patriarchal privilege in African culture and religion, including in contemporary Bible translations.1 We need more Bible translations in African contexts that are not merely produced for evangelization purposes and are thus infused with notions about biblical supremacy and the conversion of Africans to the Christian religion. Growing numbers of African Bible scholars contribute to the ongoing educational effort that exposes sexist and patriarchal translation principles and habits as intersectional with the colonizing and supremacist agenda that goes back to the colonial era. Yet, in the postcolonial era, African Bible scholars should want to press a restart button to produce African Bible translations that do not advance any more colonizing and “patriarchalizing” biblical meanings that disempower African culture and religion. Examining the history, habits, and conventions of colonial and sexist African Bible translations, this essay surveys how Bible translations produced by Western Christian missionaries distorted African cultures and religions, with special attention to the Shona people of Zimbabwe. It explains how the specific name for the Shona god, Mwari, became the name for the biblical god called Elohim in colonial-sexist translations and what this hermeneutical move has meant for the Shona people. The essay also discusses the specific cases of Gen. 1:26–27 and Gen. 2:4b–3:24 in the Shona translations. A conclusion summarizes the main findings and presents an outlook on further research done by African feminist Bible translators and interpreters.

The Problem of Colonial Bible Translations in Africa The translation of the Christian Bible into African languages is intricately tied to the colonial agenda that has aimed to dispossess African peoples of their cultures, traditions, and resources. Missionaries converted African peoples to a Christianity closely identified as Western in nature and form. Bible translations into African languages have been part of this long and arduous project that continues to this day. Musa W. Dube observes aptly the interrelationship between globalization and imperialism when she explains: If we understand postcolonialism as underlining the fact that relationships of domination and subordination that were created in modern imperialism did not end 1  See, e.g., Jeremy Punt, “(Con)figuring Gender in Bible Translation: Cultural, Translational and Gender Critical Intersections,” in Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible, ed. Musa W. Dube and R. S. Wafula (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017), 129­–55; “Whose Bible, Mine or Yours? Contested Ownership and Bible Translation in Southern Africa,” Hervormde Teologies Studies 60.1–2 (2009): 307–28.

The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts   55 when geographical independence was won, then globalization is a “mutation,” a new form of an old problem. Indeed, if we regard modern colonialism and other forms of imperialism as the search for markets and for profit making, by extending one’s influence beyond their national borders, then the relation of globalization is evident.2

Various Bible translation organizations, such as the Wycliffe Global Alliance, SIL, and the United Bible Societies, operate in Africa even today. As during the colonial period, the Bible is still seen as a central tool in the aggressive spreading of the Christian faith in Africa. The replacement of all indigenous cultures continues to be the key marker of those efforts. For instance, the Wycliffe Global Alliance considers Bible translations as critical to making disciples of every nation, and so the Alliance wants to see a translation started for every language group that needs one by the year 2025.3 In other words, the goal of suppressing African religions and cultures is not a thing of the past but still the aim of many Bible translation organizations. They still want to religiously and culturally colonize Africa. The equation of the Christian faith with Western culture has strongly influenced the translation of the Bible in sub-Saharan Africa. Hermeneutical decisions ensured the undermining of African cultures, beliefs, and practices. The translation of demons as Badimo (ancestors) in early missionary Setswana translations is a case in point.4 Indigenous African religions attributed a positive and superior position to one’s ancestors. Yet colonial Bible translations literally demonized them. Even worse, missionaries adopted the names of the African deities for the biblical God and so denied and suppressed the African conception and identity of the local deities.5 The linguistic deformations in the colonial Bible translations violated African cultures, languages, and peoples by devaluing the indigenous traditions. What became sacred and worthy of preservation was that which was deemed to be compatible to Western Christian faith, which was very minimal. Even in the current era of globalization, African cultures and traditions are still regarded as inferior to those of the West. African cultures and religions are still targeted for wholesale obliteration, as many people, including African people, still assume that African traditions do not articulate the true nature of God. Colonial Bible 2  Musa W. Dube, “Looking Back and Forward: Postcolonialism, Globalization, God and Gender,” Scriptura 92 (2006): 183. 3  So stated on the Wycliffe Associates Video Channel 2011, available at: https://www.godtube.com/ wycliffeassociates/ [accessed August 19, 2018]. 4  Musa W. Dube, “Consuming a Colonial Cultural Bomb: Translating ‘Badimo’ into ‘Demons’ in Setswana Bible,” in Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible in Africa, ed. Musa W. Dube and R. S. Wafula (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017), 3–25. 5  Dora R. Mbuwayesango, “How Local Divine Powers Were Suppressed: The Case of Mwari of the Shona,” in Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible in Africa, ed. Musa W. Dube and R. S. Wafula (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017), 115–28; Other Ways of Reading: African Women and the Bible, ed. Musa W. Dube (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2001), 63–77; Gomang Seratwa Ntloedibe-Kuswani, “Translating the Divine: The Case of Modimo in the Setswana Bible,” in Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible in Africa, ed. Musa W. Dube and R. S. Wafula (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2017), 97–114; Musa W. Dube, ed., Other Ways of Reading: African Women and the Bible (Atlanta, GA: SBL 2001), 78–99.

56   Dora R. Mbuwayesango translations are thus still revered as the best and most authentic ways of talking about God and religion.6 Another difficulty relates to the fact that missionaries are often credited with the preservation of African languages because they put those languages into writing. Yet the missionaries re-created African languages to suit their colonial desires that aimed to destroy African cultures and identities. As Dube asserts: “A language is a culture. A language is a text or canon that bears the culture and culture is language.”7 Although missionaries relied on Africans, especially African men, and used them as walking dictionaries, they re-created African languages to accommodate their evangelizing agenda. When the missionaries deemed African words as incompatible with their views about the Christian faith, they “Africanized” European expressions and words. For instance, they rendered the Hebrew noun nabi’ into muprofita and moporofeti in the Shona and Setswana Bibles respectively, adding prefixes to the basic English word of the noun, because they found the Shona and Setswana equivalents for “prophet” too barbaric and heathen-influenced.8 One of the most significant shortcomings of the colonial Bible translations, however, is the fact that the English translation of the King James Version served as the foundation for African translations but not the original Hebrew or Greek texts. Even today, when indigenous speakers are involved in the translation process, revisions and new Bible translations are usually based on Western hermeneutical theories. Jeremy Punt points out assumptions of Western supremacy in African Bible translations when he explains: “The UBS [United Bible Societies] would insist, for example, on having one of their consultants on the translation team and that their ‘recommended and supplied’ commentaries be consulted.”9 Secrecy is another feature permeating Bible translating culture, and so it is usually impossible to know the demographics of the employed Bible translators and consultants. Yet in most Bible translation organizations evangelical conservative theologians govern and support the various projects, and translation consultants are Western scholars who oversee poorly skilled teams of indigenous translators. Usually, the work excludes academically credentialed African Bible scholars, as S. V. Coertze deduces from a questionnaire distributed to a random group of SIL translators when he explains: “All the African biblical interpreters could be considered as ordinary biblical interpreters, some of whom without having completed primary school

6  See Aloo O. Mojola, “How the Bible Is Received in Communities: A Brief Overview with Particular Reference to East Africa,” in Scripture, Community and Mission, ed. Philip Wickeri (Hong Kong: Christian Conference of Asia, 2002), 45–69. 7  Musa W. Dube, “Christianity and Translation in the Colonial Context,” in The Routledge Companion to Christianity, ed. Elias Kifon Bongmba (London: Routledge, 2016), 164. 8  Lovemore Togarasei, “The Shona Bible and the Politics of Translation,” in Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Interpretations, ed. Musa W. Dube, Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012), 185–98. 9  Jeremy Punt, “Whose Bible, Mine or Yours? Contested Ownership and Bible Translation in Southern Africa,” Hervormde Teologiese Studies 60.1–2 (2004): 323.

The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts   57 requirements.”10 The exclusion, even shunning, of African Bible scholars from Bible translation projects reflects the ulterior goal of the various missionary societies and organizations. They aim to convert Africans to the Christian faith defined according to Western evangelical-colonial theologies. Finally, colonial Bible translations that Western missionaries published and distributed to African peoples across the continent of Africa were heavily shaped by patriarchal and sexist ideologies and theological convictions of women as secondary to men. All Christian missionaries hold on to strong gender prejudices and their Bible translations reflect this bias. Relegating African women to inferior positions and uplifting African men, colonial officials, and missionaries alike articulated and practiced disparaging and dehumanizing notions about all Africans but especially about African women. As Elizabeth Schmidt notes: “Colonial records are filled with adjectives characterizing African women as ‘indolent,’ ‘lazy,’ ‘slothful,’ ‘immoral,’ ‘frivolous,’ ‘savage,’ and ‘uncivilized.’ ”11 Colonial translators considered African women as unqualified to perform any kind of mission work. For instance, missionaries opposed employing Shona women as teachers or catechists, claiming that they would jeopardize the entire missionary project because “the women are too ignorant, too volatile, and feather-headed to allow them to be entrusted with such a charge.”12 Consequently, even today’s Bible translation societies do not employ African women translators as much as African men translators. As Dube notes, the United Bible Society (UBS) hired only four women as consultants in 2016, and women translators constitute less than 4 percent for the entire continent of Africa.13 Unsurprisingly, feminist hermeneutical ideas in the various Bible translations and revisions are systematically excluded in the ongoing aggressive spread of the Bible. In Africa male translators, unencumbered by feminist hermeneutical insights, produce officially recognized Bible translations to this very day.

The Development of Missionary Bible Translations for the Shona Peoples The first missionary attempt to bring the Bible to the Shona people failed completely. It goes back to 1560 when a Portuguese Jesuit, Dançalo da Silveria, was killed before he had made any serious missionary impact in pre-colonial Zimbabwe. The Portuguese attempt was followed by the Congregationalist arrival in the 1870s and by the Dutch Reformed Church and the Berlin Missionary Society shortly thereafter. The Anglicans arrived in 10  S. V. Coertze, “The African Agent Discovered: The Recognition and Involvement of the African Biblical Interpreter in Bible Translation,” Verbum et Ecclesia 29.1 (2008): 83. 11  Elizabeth Schmidt, Peasants, Traders, & Wives: Shona Women in the History of Zimbabwe, 1870–1939 (Harare: Baobab, 1992), 99. 12  S. J. Richartz, “Women’s Work in the Foreign Missions,” Zambesi Mission Record 4.54 (1911): 312. 13  Dube, “Christianity in Translation,” 170.

58   Dora R. Mbuwayesango the 1880s. None of the Western missionary groups succeeded. Only after the British South Africa Company under Cecil John Rhodes had successfully occupied Mashonaland did the different missionary societies begin to experience some success. All later missionary groups settled in regions in which African people spoke the different dialects of the Shona language. They included Karanga in the southern region, Manyika and Ndau in the eastern region, Zezuru in the central region, and Korekore in the northern region. The different dialects can be traced back to the earliest translation attempts, according to which each dialect appeared in the region in which the respective mission groups had settled. Like most other African societies, precolonial Shona cultures were oral and not literate, and so Western missionaries developed orthographies for their various Bible translations. Since Western missionaries preferred the New Testament over the Old Testament, their translations focused on the New Testament and Psalm 23.14 The missionaries translated portions of the Bible that they considered essential for the teaching of the Gospel message. Four versions of the New Testament existed by 1910. One was in ChiKaranga, another in Manyika, yet another in Zezuru, and still another in Ndau. Soon a common Shona Bible, based on a common orthography, was published. Hebert Chimhundu explains: The interest of the missionaries was certainly not academic or linguistic but evangelization. They needed a Bible that could be produced in one form that could be used in all the dialect areas, because producing different versions for each area would be too expensive for the respective population sizes. Support for publication was undertaken by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge (SPCK) and the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS), which actually published a number of smaller items in the different dialects and orthographies. The missionaries also needed to produce vernacular readers, which they could use in their African schools. At the same time, the Native Department was also demanding that the language question should be settled in order to facilitate some of their administrative activities.15

The Shona Union orthography, a combination of Roman letters and symbols, was reached under the leadership of Clement Doke in 1929, and the government approved it in 1931.16 The first Bible translation into Shona was the New Testament in 1941 and a complete Shona Union Bible appeared in 1949. It has since been revised in 1995 to remove the Doke symbols—Bhaibheri Magwaro Matsvene a Mwari. The Bible Society of Zimbabwe published a new translation in 1979; it is called Bhaibheri: Chitenderano Chekare ne Chitenderano Chitsva. Interestingly, however, the Shona peoples prefer the earlier translation to the new Shona orthography. They sense that the missionary Bible 14  Andrew Louw of the Dutch Reformed Church operating in the southern region recording in his diary: “Today I found time to review Psalm 23, John 3:16 and ‘Our Father’ ”; see W. J. Van der Merwe, The Day Star Arises in Mashonaland (Morgenster: Morgenster Press, 1953), 24. 15  Herbert Chimhundu, “Doke and the Development of Standard Shona,” in The Report on the Unification of Shona Dialects, ed. Clement Doke (Oslo: ALLEX-Project, 2005), 8–76. 16  George Fortune, “75 Years of Writing in Shona,” Zambesia (1969): 55–62.

The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts   59 was never developed to learn from it but to teach them about Western notions about God and the Christian faith divorced from their indigenous experiences. The purpose of the missionary translations was the conversion of the Shona peoples and not mutual exchange from two equal cultures.

The Identification of the Shona God with the Biblical God Perhaps the most dramatic impact of the colonial-patriarchal Bible translations on the Shona cultures had to do with the abrupt Christianization of the Shona god, Mwari. Because the missionaries wanted to convert the Shona peoples to the biblical deity, they tried to make the biblical deity relevant and acceptable to the Shona peoples. Initially the missionaries were reluctant to identify the biblical deity with the Shona god. They erroneously deemed the Shona concept of god as lacking two essential characteristics of the biblical deity, namely to be the judge and the creator.17 Thus, prior to the standardization of the Shona language from various Shona dialects, Western missionaries identified the biblical deity with various Shona terms. The Dutch Reformed missionaries used Modzimo/ Mudzimu, which in Shona means “Ancestral Spirit.”18 They also used Mudzimu Wedenga, which means “Ancestral Spirit of the Sky.”19 The Catholic Jesuits preferred Yave because they wanted to maintain the distinction between Mwari and the biblical deity. In contrast, the Dominicans used Mwari from the start.20 Similarly, Anglicans, Methodists, and other Christian Western latecomers, such as the Salvation Army, used exclusively the Shona divine name Mwari for the biblical deity.21

17  George Fortune, “Who was Mwari?,” Rhodesian History Journal of the Central African Historical Society 4 (1973): 8–9. 18 In Buke eo ko Ravisa Tshekaranga (The Book for Learning Karanga Language) (Middleburg, South Africa: 1899); Wedepohl, Mashoko e Buke eo Modzimo (Compiled Bible Stories) (Berlin: Evangelical Missiongesellschaft, 1902); J. T. Helm and A. A. Louw, Evangeli ea Mattheus (Translation of Matthew’s Gospel) (London: British Foreign Bible Society, 1904); Nziyo dzechiKaranga dze “De Ned. Ger. Kereke pa Mashonaland” (Karanga Hymns for the Mashonaland Church) (Cape Town: Citadel Press, 1910); Vunzo dzeshoko ro Mudzimu (Questions on the Word of God) (Fort Victoria, Rhodesia: Morgenster Mision, 1912). 19 Ibid.; Mashoko e Bibele (The Bible Stories) (Belingwe, Rhodesia: Southern Rhodesia Church of Sweden Mission, 1927). How does a reader know what “Ibid.” refers to? The previous footnote contains several items. I oppose this footnote change. 20 A. M. Hartmann, Rugwaro rgwo Kunamata (Chishawasha, Rhodeisa: Jesuits Mission, 1898); E. Biehler, Zwinamato Zwineitikwa (Roermond, Holland: J. J. Romen, 1906); Testament Itswa ya She Wedu Jesu Kristu no Rurimi rwe Chishona (The New Testament of Our Lord Jesus Christ in Shon) (London: British and Foreign Bible Society, 1907); F. Mayr, Katekisima re Makristo e Sangano re Katolike (Pinetown, South Africa: Miriannhill, 1910). 21  See, e.g., for the Anglicans: Minamato neZwiyimbo Yamana weSangano (London: SPCK, 1900); for the Methodists: H. E. Springer, A Handbook of Chikaranga (Cincinnati, OH: Jennings & Graham, 1905); for the Salvation Army: Chizezuru and Chinyanja Songs (Cape Town: Salvation Army, 1920).

60   Dora R. Mbuwayesango Yet after the standardization of the Shona language, all missionary branches identified the Shona deity Mwari with the biblical deity. Accordingly, the complete Union Shona Bible of the Hebrew and Greek Testaments that was published in 1949 utilized the Doke orthography and translated the biblical God as Mwari. Hence, the current translation of the Shona Bible declares in Gen. 1:1: “In the beginning Mwari created the heavens and the earth” (Pakutanga Mwari akasika denga nenyika). The Shona deity Mwari replaces the biblical deity, Elohim, without any further explanation. The translation simply replaces the Shona idea about Mwari with the biblical god. The colonizing translation has been utterly successful to this very day. The adoption of the Shona name Mwari for the deity was also successfully implemented in other biblical texts. For instance, another name for the deity appears in Gen. 2:4b–3:24 where “Elohim” is combined with “Yhwh.” In the earliest version of the complete 1950 Shona Bible, Yhwh is translated as “Jehova/Jehovha.” Yet later revisions translate the Hebrew phrase “Yhwh Elohim” as “Jehovha Mwari.” Some Catholic liturgical and catechetical books translate Yhwh as “Yave,” as if the term is translated from the original Hebrew text. In the 1979 Shona translation, another term, tenzi, is introduced for Yhwh. The Shona noun “tenzi” appears in capitalized letters, TENZI, in apparent similarity to the rendering into “LORD” as it is done in English translations. However, the Shona noun “tenzi” means “master” and not “lord.” Edward R. Hope and Ignatius Chidavaenzi also aim for the proper equation of the Shona Mwari with the biblical god when they assert that Mwari means “the one who exists.”22 In short, the use of the term “Mwari” in the creation narratives of the book of Genesis helps in cementing the equation of the Shona deity with the biblical god. Mwari turns into the biblical deity and, as a result, Mwari ceases to be the traditional god of the Shona and is divorced from the Shona cultural and religious contexts. Contemporary Shona people cannot even think of Mwari in non-biblical ways anymore. The conversion process has been total.

The Gendering of the Shona God in the Colonial Translations The identification of the Shona deity Mwari with the biblical creator god had devastating implications for Shona culture. Mwari of the Shona tradition was originally a genderless and spiritual reality. Yet the colonial identification of the biblical god as Mwari turned the notion of the Shona deity into a tangible form. Moreover, it turned Mwari into a male deity. Other gendered notions changed Shona vocabulary as well. Missionaries began identifying the male human (‘adam) in the Bible with the noun for humanity, “munhu,” in Shona. The male becomes conflated with the human. As a consequence, the 22  Edward R. Hope and Ignatius Chidavaenzi, “Translating the Divine Name YHWH in Shona,” The Bible Translator 35.2 (1984): 211–15.

The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts   61 woman becomes excluded from the notion of humanity and, in fact, secondary to it. This enormous shift is most prominently expressed in the translation of Gen. 1:26–27. The verses juxtapose the Hebrew words of male (zakar) and female (neqebah) in the English translation, in the Shona Bible both words are translated as “man/husband” (murume) and “woman/wife” (mukadzi). If the original Hebrew had been the source text of the Shona translation, the words would have been translated as “male” (hono/ rume) and “female” (hadzi/kadzi) respectively, without any reference to a heterosexual notion of sexuality. The translation would then be like this:

Saka Elohim (Mwari) akasika munhu ne mufananidzo wake.

Thus Elohim (God) created humanity in its image.

Mumufananidzo waElohim (waMwari) akamusika.

In the image of Elohim (of God) it created it.

Hono nehadzi akazvisika.

Male and female it created them. 

However, the Shona Bible of 2002 offers the following translation:

Saka Mwari akasika munhu nomufananidzo wake, akamusika mumufananidzo waMwari; akavasika murume nomukadzi. 

So Mwari created humanity in his image. He created him in the image of Mwari. He created them husband/man and wife/woman.

Clearly, then, the Shona translation of Gen. 1:26–27 results in a new and different conceptualization of the Shona deity as gendered. Most importantly, it introduces a rigid gender binary that did not exist in the pre-missionary Shona understanding of humanity or munhu. As a result of the colonial-patriarchal translation, rigid gender views become dominant in Shona life. The Shona peoples come to accept that humanity exists in the strict gender binary of female and male. The focus on maintaining the biblically prescribed rigid gender binary still informs the homophobic stance found in sub-Saharan Africa even today. In contrast, pre-colonial Africa had a flexible gender system and gender-bending practices that allowed the interchanging roles, functions, and power systems of both men and women. As Ifi Amadiume demonstrates in the context of the Igbo people of Nigeria, the binary view of gender did not exist in Africa prior to the colonial imposition of sexual difference as constructed in Western culture.23 Thus, the translation of Gen. 1:26–27 into Shona introduced not only a Western gender ideology alien to African practice and thought but it also imposed Western gender norms onto African cultures with the power of the Bible. Rigid binary gender norms are thus difficult to uproot even today because missionary Bible translations introduced them and by now they are deeply enmeshed with African cultures. 23  Ifi Amadiume, Male Daughters and Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society (London: Zed Books, 2015).

62   Dora R. Mbuwayesango The detrimental impact of the rigid binary gender system that Western colonial Bibles brought to the Shona peoples is even more visible in the translation of ‘adam in Gen. 2:4b–3:24. Apart from suppressing Shona etiologies, the colonial Bible translations introduced powerful patriarchal notions to the Shona culture that have been particularly detrimental to Shona women. It begins with the Shona translation of Gen. 2:7 where Mwari molds “Adam” (munhu, i.e. the human being) from the soil of the ground (ivhu repasi). The poetic connection in Hebrew between ‘adam and ‘adamah does not exist in the Shona translation because the Shona words for humanity (munhu) and for the ground (pasi/ivhu) are different by sound or linguistic origin. Yet in Hebrew it is clear that the human being (‘adam) is a lump of soil (‘adamah), brought to life by the breath of the deity. In the Shona translation, munhu is placed in the garden that the deity planted; munhu has the mandate to work the garden and to take care of it, with some limitation on the consumption from the trees of the garden (2:8–17). The Shona translation of Gen. 2:4b–25 introduces the supremacy of the man and the inferiority of the woman, an utterly patriarchal notion. Accordingly, the Shona translation conflates ‘adam with “male.” For instance, in Gen. 2:18 the deity states that it is not good for munhu to be alone. The deity also wants to remedy the shortcoming by making “a helper fit for him” (mubatatsiri akamumukwanira). This translation of the Hebrew phrase, ezer kenegdo, is usually translated into English as “a helper fit for him,” indicating that munhu is no longer imagined as a human that Gen. 1:27 defines as both female and male. Rather, in Gen. 2:22 munhu refers exclusively to the male (murume), and so the Shona Bible reads: “God made woman from the rib taken from the human, and then brought her to the man” (akaita mukadzi kubva parumbavhu rwaakanga a bvisa pamunhu, uye akamuuyisa kumurume). In v. 22, the Hebrew text introduces the nouns, ‘ish and ‘ishshah, that are usually translated as “man” and “woman” in English. The morphological relationship between the two words is evident in both Hebrew and English, but in Shona no morphological connection exists between the Shona terms, murume and mukadzi. Hence, the claim that mukadzi was derived from murume implies that the humanness of the mukadzi is dependent on her connection to the murume. According to the stated purpose, the woman, mukadzi, is a suitable helper for the man, murume, who is identified as the human in the equation. Moreover, the woman is made of less than the man because she is made from the rib of the man. In the colonial-patriarchal translation of this verse, the woman’s inferiority and her subordination to the man is thus designed by Mwari, and hence her subordination and secondary status become an undisputed ultimate reality. It gets worse. The translation of Gen. 2:4b–25 does not only prescribe the woman’s subordination and secondary status, but it also introduces the colonial-patriarchal ideology of heteronormativity into Shona culture. In the translation of this biblical text heterosexuality appears as the only divinely legitimate expression of sexuality that privileges male sexuality. In fact, it depicts male sexual pleasure as the sole purpose for woman who is characterized as man’s possession. The male has sexual autonomy whereas the woman’s sexuality belongs to the man. Furthermore, the submission of the woman (mukadzi) to the man (murume) is reinforced in Gen. 3:16 in which her submission results from her eating the fruit from the

The Challenge of Feminist Bible Translations in African Contexts   63 forbidden tree in the divinely planted garden (Gen. 2:10–17). The original Hebrew text depicts the patriarchal idea that women deserve the pain of childbirth when the deity prescribes it to the woman: “I will greatly increase your pain in conception, you will give birth to children in pain” (Ndichawanza zvikuru kurwadziwa kwako nokutora mimba kwako, uchabereka vana uchirwadziwa). Yet the Shona translation goes even further when it depicts the supremacy and domination of the husband/man over the wife/ woman in the last portion of the verse: “Your will shall be to your husband, he will be your lord” (kuda kwako kuchava kumurume wako, iye achava ishe wako). Certainly, Western patriarchal ideology influenced this translation because the Hebrew pronoun, hû’, could be translated as “it” rather than “he.” More significantly, however, the Shona translation inserts a noun, ishe (lord), that does not appear in the original Hebrew text. The insertion of this noun expands the limited context of the etiology by explaining female heterosexuality and by broadening its application to the general status of women in relationship to men in Shona society. The patriarchal and heteronormative view of sexuality that privileges the male was not part of precolonial Africa. Yet Western missionaries considered this Western construct of sexuality as civilized and normative whereas they regarded the sexual ideas and practices of the Shona people, as in the rest of sub-Saharan Africa, as barbaric and incompatible with their Western notions of the Christian faith. Since early missionaries knew very little of African beliefs and practices, they were convinced that African cultures were incompatible with Christianity.24 They translated the Bible to introduce and fortify Western supremacy and patriarchy into African cultures. Thus, the notion of woman as derived from man goes back to the colonial-patriarchal translation of Genesis 2. Initially, it made no sense in Shona epistemology and society. Yet, over time, even the non-Christianized Shona peoples came to accept biblical notions about the deity, gender, and heterosexuality as normative and mandatory, having been indoctrinated systematically that their indigenous traditions are barbaric and worthless.

Toward Postcolonial-Feminist Bible Translations in Africa: A Conclusion The history of Bible translation in Africa reflects its colonial context and purpose. As an arm of the empire, the missionary weapon was the Bible because the Bible was the most important and powerful weapon in the conversion of Africans to Christianity. For the weapon to be effective, however, it had to be translated into the indigenous languages. To make the biblical god acceptable to Africans, missionaries adopted the African indigenous names for their deities. As the Shona context shows, the adoption of Mwari as the 24  The translation of Genesis revealed to the African Initiated Churches that polygyny was biblical and therefore a legitimate Christian concept of marriage. Originally, the practice of polygyny among the Shona was very limited. It was limited to royalty, special cases of barrenness, and affordability.

64   Dora R. Mbuwayesango biblical god severed Mwari from the Shona cultural and religious contexts. Mwari was changed from being a genderless spirit to a male god. Even worse, the biblical stories that now mention Mwari introduced a concept of heterosexuality and heteronormativity that did not exist in African cultures. It also introduced patriarchal ideologies about the social status of women in relationship to men that resulted in the compounded marginalization of women in Africa. The Shona translation of Gen. 1:26–27 and Gen. 2:1–3:24 introduced and emboldened homophobic, heteronormative, and heterosexual prejudices that have contributed to so much suffering in Africa. Bible translations in Africa continue to be influenced heavily by colonizing ideologies of evangelization. They are part of ventures that are designed to promote Christianity and Western cultural and religious ideas, and that still operate with the goal of obliterating African cultures and religions. Biblical scholars have to be vigilant not only in critiquing early missionary translations but even today’s translation projects. Today all Bible societies and translation organization are conservative and evangelical in their nature and goals. There is no organization that translates the Bible in Africa in­de­pend­ ent from conversion goals. Bible translations need to be interdisciplinary endeavors that take place at universities and do not promote Christianity. The academic approach requires multiple disciples, including biblical, linguistic and cultural, and feminist postcolonial studies. Most importantly, indigenous meanings of African languages have to be recovered. Hijacked in African missionary Bible translations, African terms reinforce patriarchal concepts that are not original to African cultures. Above all, the practice of adopting African indigenous names for deities in Bible translation need to cease. The gods of Africa need to be decolonized through the same way they were colonized, in Bible translation, but this time on the basis of feminist postcolonial translation principles.

Bibliography Amadiume, Ifi. Male Daughters and Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society. London: Zed Books, 2015. Dube, Musa W., Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango, eds. Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Interpretations. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Dube, Musa  W. and R.  S.  Wafula, eds. Postcoloniality, Translation, and the Bible in Africa. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017. Noss, Phillip A., ed. A History of Bible Translation. Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 2007. West, Gerald O., and Musa W. Dube, eds. The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories and Trends. Boston, MA / London: Brill, 2001. Yorke, Gosnell L. O. R., and Peter M. Renju, eds. Bible Translation and African Languages. Nairobi: Acton, 2004.

chapter 5

Qu eer Bible R e a di ngs i n Gl oba l Her m en eu tica l Perspecti v e Jeremy Punt

Entrenched heteronormative and homophobic positions in society and the academy hamper responsible engagement with biblical texts on the African continent. Questionable hermeneutics lead to claims that homosexuality is unbiblical and un-African, and generate readings of the Bible that are both homophobic and misogynist. The prevailing and continuing impact of what can be broadly called traditionalist Western scholarship on African biblical scholarship has meant the underdevelopment of critical biblical hermeneutics. African biblical scholars benefit greatly from queer biblical criticism because the latter provides hermeneutical tools to explore broader understandings of sex and gender, for the historical shaping of these categories and especially for their relevance and importance for biblical interpretation. Feminist theory strongly influenced gender criticism, especially since feminist inquiry in the 1980s and 1990s broadened its horizons beyond projects about the social history and “recovery of women.” This development enabled different approaches to the study of gender. Still, gender studies cannot be equated with feminist studies, since it includes feminist theory, feminist criticism, and women’s studies, as well as men’s or masculinity studies. As an umbrella term, gender studies also include lesbian and gay studies and queer theory. Queer thinking comprises a queer positionality or stance, and is directed to more popular, often religiously minded or even ecclesial contexts. Queer theory, in the narrower sense, takes a more academic line to queer thinking for which it has developed a theoretical apparatus. My focus is on queer theory as part of the ongoing work on the rhetorical construction of men and women, femininity and masculinity, gender in texts and discourse, as well as investigations of the social forces at work in all of these.

66   Jeremy Punt Queer theory is generally taken to be inspired by Michael Foucault, often associated with the theoretical work of philosophers and sociologists such as Judith Butler, Gayle Rubin, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, and Jeffrey Weeks. It flows from the experiences of a new generation of LGBTQIA* (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, queer, intersex, asexual, and other), feminist, and civil right activists. Teresa de Lauretis, a feminist film scholar, coined the term “queer theory” in 1991 to move beyond simplistic binaries and static, isolated, and often identitarian categories of sex and gender, to challenge ideological confines of this categorization. Queer theory destabilizes sexual identities and counters cultural prejudice against sexual minorities, such as those from the LGBTQIA* communities. Close association with the study of homosexuality means queer work also engages with presuppositions and theories that advance heterosexual prerogatives, fixed gender identities, and popular and academic notions of gender, sex, and sexuality. Queer theory challenges the paradigmatic system of meaning that produces heterosexuality and homosexuality and treats religious ideas as the cultural means of production for that system. Like queer theory, queer biblical criticism is an umbrella term for critical approaches encapsulated by it. Scholars such as Deryn Guest, Ken Stone, or Mona West and queer theologians such as Marcella Althaus-Reid, Gerard Loughlin, and Adrian Thatcher have promoted queer biblical criticism since the 2000s. Queer approaches engage biblical texts from the position that sex and gender are constructed, fluid, and complex categories. They include lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersexed perspectives and experiences, identities, and social locations. Queer biblical readings challenge the complacent acceptance of traditional sex and gender assumptions which govern biblical interpretation and heteronormative readings. Queer biblical criticism is thus characterized by destabilizing sexual identities and countering cultural prejudice against sexual minorities. It also lifts up what is considered different, abnormal, or even perverse in biblical texts, and resists theoretical frameworks on which such categories rely in order to contest accompanying claims of identity, power, and control.1 This essay presents developments in queer biblical hermeneutics as they have occurred in biblical studies since the early 2000s. Several sections organize the discussion. First, the essay explores queering and queerying readings as key categories in queer biblical hermeneutics. Second, the essay explains how queer biblical theorists (de)construct sex and gender rendering a queer liminality. Third, the essay presents how queer exegetes unravel established notions of fixed identity in the Bible and why such work matters. Fourth, the essay describes how queer biblical scholars contest biblical heteronormativity. Fifth, the essay discusses how the Bible becomes indecent literature in the hands of queer readers. Sixth, the essay analyzes why queer scholars outwit normative notions about sex and gender. Seventh, the essay illustrates that these exegetes also queer 1  “In recent years ‘queer’ has come to be used differently, sometimes as an umbrella term for a coalition of culturally marginal sexual self-identifications and at other times to describe a nascent theoretical model which has developed out of more traditional lesbian and gay studies”; see Annamarie Jagose, Queer Theory: An Introduction (New York, NY: New York University Press, 1996), 1.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   67 the interpretation history of the Bible. A conclusion summarizes the main arguments, holding that the Bible and its interpretation are indeed queer.

Queering and Queerying as Liminal Exegetical Practice The first major development that has emerged in queer biblical studies relates to two major categories. They pertain to queering and querying the Bible. “Queering” refers to investigations into the social construction of sex and gender, and “queerying” moves one step further, tracing the theoretical and political interests of such constructions, and their involvement in social dynamics and power. These two dimensions of queer readings are often both present at the same time, signaled by the use of the term queer(y)ing. Queer readings differ from lesbigay (liberation) readings, as queer theorists are skeptical about the reach of the “gay liberation” project. Such work relates to the “ethical grammar” for gay and lesbian theologies. While lesbigay biblical interpretation may search for corrective cores, the true meaning of texts and displacing straight androcentrism, queer biblical interpretation celebrates polyvalent texts and disavows hermeneutical centers as such. The conscious opposition to dominating heterosexual norms shapes the queer scholarly grammar. In fact, the rejection of heteronormativity initiates the challenge to the binary of homosexuality and heterosexuality, making their related ethical particularities obsolete. Queer theorists tend to move a step further and emphasize the importance of ­re-imagining the world that goes beyond lesbigay “liberation.”2 For instance, Timorthy R. Koch suggests that queer biblical readings surpass gay liberation.3 As Koch reflects on gay men’s social practice of “cruising” in pubs, he shows that biblical readings evolve in the readerly interaction with biblical texts. It is like cruising in bars with many unexpected shifts and turns with various conversation partners and encounters. Accordingly, Koch characterizes Elijah as a hairy leather man (2 Kgs. 1:2–8). He views Elisha as not to be baited (2 Kgs. 2:23–25), Jehu as a zealous man (2 Kgs. 10:12–17), and Ehud as an erotic judge (Judg. 3:12–16). Koch does not resolve any of the exegetical tensions generated by opponents of queer theory, and he does not minimize the political responsibility of biblical readers. Instead, he advances a political commitment of his approach in the postcolonial world. To Koch, hope for a queer future is not only self-indulgent but political. 2  It is not difficult to understand the lesbigay criticism levelled against queer theory, as queer theory substitutes the particular for generic differences. However, while the move from the particular to the generic is seen to result in loss of political power, it retains the stigma associated with non-heteronormativity. 3  See Timothy R. Koch, “Cruising as Methodology: Homoeroticism and the Scriptures,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies, vol. 334; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 169–80.

68   Jeremy Punt Although opponents to a queer hermeneutical stance accuse proponents of being too generic in purpose, the political impact is considerable. As Judith Butler asserts: “The deconstruction of identity is not the deconstruction of politics; rather, it establishes as political the very terms through which identity is articulated.”4 Similar to the lesbigay hermeneutic, then, queer biblical readers insist on the political nature of their biblical readings. They question the ostensible stability of heteronormative social patterns by pointing out its constructed nature and the destabilizing and political potential of queer hermeneutics. Unfortunately, the manifold advances made by exegetes who queer and queery the Bible are mostly ignored in the field of biblical studies. Still, the advances in queer hermeneutics are impressive and the effects of the sex- and gender-obfuscating notions that this interpretation more strongly affects the control and regulation of sex and gender than most scholars are willing to admit. Queer exegetes, for instance, insist that queer Bible readers assume the text as fluid and interpretations as transgressing dominant norms and categories. More importantly, these readers presuppose that the silence(-ing) of biblical queerness is “a conscious effort to suppress the truth and has more to do with the dominant practices of biblical interpretation.”5 The queer challenge of dominant meanings makes room for liminal practices, which is the aim of queer interpretations. Thus, liminality and queerness feed off each other. Queer interpretations give liminality queerness and make queerness liminal.

Queer(y)ing Liminality: The (De) construction of Sex and Gender Another development in queer biblical hermeneutics pertains to the important notion of querying liminality. It arises from the fluidity of sex and gender and is related to the construction of sex and gender.6 Queer theorists stress the fluidity of human sexuality. They scrutinize attempts to regulate it in intellectual categories and social practices. Queer theories explain that nothing about human sex and sexuality is (pre-)determined. They maintain that social and personal categories that structure and monitor sexuality are contingent on social location. The notion of the fluidity of sex gives impetus to the development of queering and queerying strategies. Queer interpreters assume that gender and sex are social constructs and not biologically or physiologically based notions. Queering gender and sex occurs when interpreters expose the systems and 4  Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (Thinking Gender, vol. 2; New York, NY: Routledge, 1990), 148. 5  Anthony Heacock, Jonathan Loved David: Manly Love in the Bible and the Hermeneutics of Sex (Bible in the Modern World, vol. 22; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2001), ix. 6  In so far as queer theory investigates the fluidity of sexuality and sexual identities as concepts formulated and employed in our contemporary context, the use of queer theory in the discussion of first-century Mediterranean sex and gender is limited. The focus here is, rather, on queer theory’s ability to provide analytical categories for the social construction of sex and gender, and its power plays.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   69 structures of convention that determine the form and function of sex and gender. Thus, the central queering claim is that gender and sex are manufactured entities. In this sense, queering interpretations impact identity and social dynamics in many ways.7 Queer interpreters also refer to queer theory as “queerying” when they take social constructionism a step further. Queerying takes account of the theoretical and political interests at work. It is about the study of social dynamics and power play in regard to sex and gender. Queer interpreters queery texts when they identify those who benefit from sex and gender constructions. When exegetes utilize queer theory, they engage both queering and querying strategies. Thus, queering, which is focused on the construction of gender and sex, and querying, which emphasizes power interests, are interrelated. Queer biblical interpretation destabilizes sex and gender in biblical texts by ­constructing liminal identities and refusing to confirm essentialist identities.8 Queer interpretations produce portrayals of sex and gender that put people and even God into liminal positions. These interpretations re-define, re-describe, and re-inscribe power because they acknowledge how biblical texts regulate power and control through sex. Thus, the reciprocal relation between queering and liminality means that liminality results from the queering of sex while liminality induces queered sexualities. In other words, the interrelationship of sex and gender, as well as of power and control highlight each of these elements. The interrelationship compels contemporary interpreters to source appropriate theoretical apparatuses with which to investigate sex and gender as well as power and control, both as important issues in themselves and jointly for being mutually informing elements in the interpretation process. Queer theorists explore liminality through visible and hidden gaps and indeterminacies in biblical texts. In fact, queer theorists invite alternative readings in which liminality features prominently. At times, liminality and marginality also become empowering perspectives.9 Liminality remains a slippery concept, however, especially when theorists (re)claim marginality as a place of radical openness and possibility.10 In the hands of queer theorists, the liminality of queer reading results in unsettled and indecent interpretations. They also usurp hermeneutical power and control, unravel identity, and challenge heteronormativity. 7  Homosexual identity, for example, challenges the patriarchal system whose interest in ownership outranks the importance of romantic love and commitment. Patriarchy requires monogamous security to safeguard the paternity of children, whereas women treasure the perceived security of monogamous relationships beyond their own interests. This situation often fuels rivalry with other women as possible contenders. In a patriarchal world, men expect women to exhibit an ethic of service that prioritizes male heterosexual desire. 8  The sheer force, exerted by frequent repetition and enduring assumptions which secures conventional interpretation, resists such destabilization. In fact, conventional readings are often uncritical and almost unconsciously entrench a particular reading style. 9  “The subversiveness of a religious system lies in its sexual subversions, in that disorderly core of abnormal sexual narratives where virgins give birth and male trinities may signify the incoherence of one male definition only in the tension between patriarchal identity and difference”; see Marcella Althaus-Reid, Indecent Theology: Theological Perversions in Sex, Gender and Politics (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2000), 18. 10  bell hooks, Yearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural Politics (London: Routledge, 2015), 223–38.

70   Jeremy Punt

Unravelling Identity The third major development characterizing queer biblical hermeneutics relates to the notion of unravelling identity. This concept follows the queer contestation of seemingly stable sex and gender categories. It has become common to see sex and gender as major components informing human personality and identity, particularly in regard to femininity and masculinity and notions of the sexual self. The queering approach to texts focuses on the construction of sex and gender, the fluidity of such categories and the resulting liminality of sexed and gendered bodies. Queer theory’s relationship to identity, then, is not promotional of a specific array of rival identities with which to construct oppositional politics. Rather, the queer position refuses coherent identities promoted by neoliberalism or related practices that identity politics construe. Queer theory disrupts and politicizes normal relations between and among sex, gender, bodies, sexuality, and desire. In fact, the “anti-identitarianism” of queer theory creates alternative possibilities for investigation that energize queer scholarship. Queer theory’s disavowal of fixed identities does not nullify its concerns about the conceptualization of identity. Instead, it refocuses attention on its ever changing and non-material conceptualization. Queer theory’s relationship with the politics of identity is uneasy and variable. While scholars such as Monica Wittig consider homosexuality a metaphysical category, Judith Butler sees a link between the fluidity of the term queer and its usefulness. Butler insists that the term “can never be fully owned, but always and only redeployed, twisted, queered from previous usage.”11 For others, queer includes all notions of difference, as well as the difference of difference itself, assuming a Derrideanlike differance. Queer theory questions fixed gender identity and associated categories, and it perceives identity as multiple, unstable and regulatory, and it celebrates difference. As Butler maintains, the deconstruction of identity provides the politics for articulating identity.12 For instance, in the Hebrew Bible, the male patriarchs identify with the people of ancient Israel. Simultaneously, they see themselves as the consort of God. Thus, Gerard Loughlin maintains that the patriarchs are a wife to God, “who has entered into a marriage contract with them—as the prophets Hosea, Jeremiah and Ezekiel testify—and who ravishes them.”13 The Hebrew Bible’s narrative undermines the staunch masculine identity associated with fatherhood. This identity-unsettling image is taken further, becoming more radical in expression. Ezek. 16:6–9 provides a detailed, graphic description wherein the relationship between God and Israel is sexually consummated. Loughlin states: “God washes away the blood of Israel’s ‘deflowering’; and male circumcision 11 Butler, Gender Trouble, 142. 12  Ibid., 148. 13  Gerard Loughlin, “Biblical Bodies,” Theology & Sexuality 12 (2005): 23. The sex and gender of the early followers of Jesus are also queered, with males being included as Christ’s brides in metaphorical sense (Eph. 5:29–32), as much as “Christian” women were included among Jesus’s brothers (Rom. 8:28–9). He states: “If only at a symbolic level, all Christian men are queer”; see ibid., 24.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   71 becomes the mark, in her flesh, of God’s possession.”14 The consequence of inscribing God sexually, or at least ascribing sexuality to God, means that the depiction of God queers the men of Israel. They are like women in their relationship to God or, perhaps even stronger, they are like men sleeping with men as with women (see Lev. 18:20).15 Their gender identity unravels in front of the readerly eyes. Queer theorists, striving to unravel identity formed through conventionalized sex and gender patterns, show that the powerful establish and maintain themselves by eliminating the subjugated and the weak. Queer theorists agree with feminist and Foucauldian thought that the erasure of the subjugated creates the dominant. Alert to the unravelling of sexual identities, queer interpreters challenge Hebrew Bible scholarship that justifies modern normativities and heteronormativity in particular. Clearly, heterosexism is a social construct that sustains its normativity by constructing itself in opposition to homosexuality. Ironically, however, the term heterosexuality enters the English language only after the invention of the term homosexuality. For a long time, people used ancient texts for which homosexual or heterosexual did not exist either as categories or as ground for opinions about such categories. In fact, in the past a wide variety of same-sex practices informed by class (slavery), power (war and conquest), social convention (pederasty), and other situations and conditions prevailed. Consequently, queer theorists challenge heterosexist thought despite its centuries-lasting dominance in human societies.

Challenging (Contemporary) Heteronormativity A fourth development that has been central in queer Bible hermeneutic is the challenge of contemporary norms of heteronormativity. Queer interpreters challenge proponents that use biblical texts to justify heteronormative practices. The multi-focal orientation of interpreters, constituted by personal, structural, societal, and academic considerations, can become so narrow that it merely re-inscribes patriarchy and conventional gender norms, rather than queering and queerying textual meanings. Queer theorists, exploring the gap between modern assumptions framed by normativities, often contest the broad footprint of heteronormativity. These scholars offer examples that unpack the assumptions feeding into heteronormativity, informed by the Bible and Western culture in the social design of the human body, complete with a sense of individual bodily 14  Loughlin, “Biblical Bodies,” 24. 15  An early example of the way in which gender determines and steers sex is the influence of God’s ascribed male gender on God’s sex: “[T]his becomes all too evident when divinity is used to underwrite certain human orderings, and most notably those that exclude women from certain kinds of power. It is then that we discover that women are not fully human because not really divine—in the way that men are. We discover that gender neutrality is a ruse of male partiality”; see Loughlin, “Biblical Bodies,” 13.

72   Jeremy Punt identity and with (the bodies of) other people. In a sense, therefore, heteronormativity relies on assumptions about gender and sexuality. Traditionalists claim that they are derived from the Bible. Alternatively, queer theorists show that they are imposed on the Bible. Scholarly normativity maps the body and sexually colonizes it through the emphasis on the difference of gender and sexuality. Such mapping and controlling relied on the construction of binary opposites, such as man-woman, virgin-harlot, cleanunclean, or heterosexual-homosexual. While queer theory anticipates and even celebrates sex and gender differences, heteronormativity relies upon established and fixed sex and gender patterns. In all its disruptiveness and transgressiveness, queer theory produces difference through questioning conventional and anticipating alternatives.16 It disrupts stable and normal categories that convention offers as normative sexual identities, going beyond categories such as male and female, thereby challenging heteronormativity. With reference to Jonathan’s incorporation of intimacy, love, and commitment in his friendship with David, Heacock describes Jonathan’s and David’s relationship as a challenge to normative heteronormative, masculine ideals of male friendship over against the hegemonic discrepancies between normal and perverse, gay and straight, or friend and lover.17 In addition to the disruption of the stability and apparent naturalness or givenness of heterosexuality, a queer reading also refuses to ascribe a “gay” identity to Jonathan. Heacock thus shows that the queer analysis also disturbs the notion of homosexuality as a stable signifier for homosexual, lesbigay, and transgendered men and women. Above all, the queer unsettling of homosexual stability plays havoc with heteronormativity, which relies on the former’s stability to maintain itself. Queer readings challenge textually assumed heteronormativity. Heteronormativity is responsible for the naturalization of masculinity and femininity as categories. It is also responsible for those hegemonic patterns that determine the conventional categories of masculinity and femininity. Heteronormativity determines many textual conventions that generalize the center that turn straight men and masculinity into the universal ideal. In contrast, queer readers uncover queer textual centers, i.e. women, femininity, and LGBTQIA* folks, presenting them as no longer deviant, secondary, and inferior. In this fashion queer criticism is a hermeneutical position that refers to the outside of the norm. Theoretically, queer theory is related to feminist and postcolonial theories, as they emphasize the constructed nature of supposedly stable identities, such as homosexuality, heterosexuality, race, nationality, woman, or man. For instance, queer readings of the Genesis accounts recover the androgynous portrayal of the first human. They 16  The importance of difference for queer thinking is not primarily about celebrating variety, as difference includes difference in solidarity by acknowledging the different experiences of black, white, disabled, poor, rich, male, female, and transgendered queers. Difference is not viewed as problematic or addressed through the creation of hierarchies or binaries. The latter privileges certain forms of understanding and celebrates this insight as truth rather than as a threat; see Stuart et al., Religion is a Queer Thing, 3. Also see Teresa W. Hornsby and Ken Stone, Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship, x–xii, on chaos, the need for it, and the celebration thereof. 17 Heacock, Jonathan Loved David, 149.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   73 explain that an all-inclusive gender describes God in Gen. 1:26; 5:1–2. Given the importance of gender for the socio-cultural worldviews, conventions, and constructions of communities and societies, the dual-gendered depiction of God contributes to destabilizing and counter-cultural notions. It also challenges the prevailing male-female gender constructions. Unsurprisingly, the earliest Jewish commentaries on Genesis refer to Adam as created in the likeness of God and thus as at first intersexed creature.18 As queer Bible critics increasingly challenge heteronormativity in biblical texts and traditions, they have also destabilized prevailing assumptions about proper sexual and gendered behavior. Queer Bible critics thus agree with queer theorists that the binary of masculinity and femininity is a social construction, serving political hegemonic purposes other than reflecting the inevitable nature of men or women, as it is proclaimed with references to a divinely ordained Bible. In contrast to dominant readings that at­trib­ute binaries such as strong-weak, intelligent-stupid, or outgoing-domestic to men and women respectively, the book of Genesis portrays Jacob’s gender performance as not befitting a man in ancient Israel. Jacob associates primarily with his mother and lives in her domestic space. He cooks! Yet in spite of his non-traditional portrayal, Jacob and not his very manly brother Esau becomes Israel’s eponymous ancestor. Similarly, Joseph dresses in a colorful princess robe, thereby casting him in an atypical role for a man. Another example appears in the story about Lot’s daughters who are sexually resourceful in their effort to ensure their progeny. Likewise, the wife of Potiphar treats Joseph as a sexual object and not the other way around (Gen. 19:30–38; 39:1–23). The zeal and phallocentric overtones when Jael and the woman of Thebez kill men (Judg. 4:17–22; 10:50–54) also render the standard heteronormative binaries uncertain. Such queering instances in the biblical narrative show both the constructed nature of sex and gender categories cited in support of heteronormativity, and the inherent instability of these categories. Heteronormative renderings do not present the sum-total of the Hebrew Bible. Queer Bible theorists challenge contemporary heteronormativity by highlighting the ideological, ingrained thought-patterns on which heteronormativity is built. Queer interpreters queer the perceived, conventional “non-difference” of heteronormativity, what is so often presented as both natural and (therefore) divinely ordained. Heteronormative assumptions, however, are not “natural,” “normal,” or “common-sense.” Rather, they are socially constructed and imbued with power-interests. Queer theorists denounce the portrayal of sexuality as a universal and eternal drive as one of the central assumptions of heteronormativity. This universalized portrayal is a mainstay of heteronormativity, but it creates a false impression since sexuality and erotic desire exist only within history. It makes sense only within historical contexts. Queer interpretation thus not only 18  A (dual-)sexed God presents a challenge to the traditional notion of a sexless God; see Loughlin, “Biblical Bodies,” 9–27. It is unsurprising to find others arguing that in Genesis 1 and 2 the emphasis is on a “no-body” God, connecting this concept to monotheistic isolation and the absence of a physical body, and similarly raising questions as to whether God should be conceived of in terms of sexuality or sex. Ancient rabbis understood Gen. 1:27–8 to refer to Adam as being created intersexed, not just male or female, but both. This is the image of God in which humankind was created, and God divided Adam into male and female only at a later stage.

74   Jeremy Punt questions the liberal attempt to bestow normalcy on queerness. It also proceeds in queering and queerying normalcy itself. The real issue pertains to the process of normalization since the goal of queer political movement is not assimilation but deconstruction, disruption, and questioning normality itself. Queer theorists challenge the notion of gender dimorphism because they do not regard people as either male or female.

Indecent Queering Since the 2000s, a fifth development, shaping queer bible hermeneutics, relates to the assertion that queer indecency or indecent queering facilitate alternative biblical readings. For instance, humor aids the transgressing of sex and gender borders. Rahab’s role in Joshua 2 is not only humorous, it borders on being indecent. As a sex-worker, Rahab is defined by her public sexual availability. She is also the protagonist in the narrative. The frequent portrayal of the Canaanite identity as non-heteronormative in the Hebrew Bible and Rahab’s ambiguous support and subversion of the Israelite antipathy toward Canaanites turn her into a trickster rather than a heroine.19 Such a queer reading not only challenges heteronormativity but moves in the direction of indecency. The female sex-worker receives a central but gender-transgressive role in a narrative dominated by a somewhat ambiguous warrior masculinity. The prophetic marriage metaphor in the Hebrew Bible is even clearer in its allusion to indecent queering. Conventional interpretations merely absorb and normalize this metaphor. The prophets use contentious sexual and marital images among male-dominated audiences. They challenge the gender dynamics between texts, original audiences, and contemporary readers. Yet a queer reading is alert to literary cues and feminist concerns and so disturbs the marriage metaphor of Jeremiah 2–3, Hosea 2, and Ezekiel 16 and 23. Indecent queering uncovers the gender performativity at work in these texts.20 Moreover, an indecent reading queers Ezekiel 23 and its emphasis on male ejaculation by exposing the text as male fantasy about female desire. The texts also works with the humorous undertones of the exaggeration of Oholibah’s sexual perversity.21 Erotic and graphic descriptions do not only shift positionalities but also the focus in the text from Oholibah or Israel to the narrator or Yahweh. The identification of the originally male audience with the unfaithful and faithful wife challenges the marriage metaphor as the basis for heterosexual relations and marriage. It debunks traditionally heteronormative 19  Erin Runions, “From Disgust to Humor: Rahab’s Queer Effect,” in Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship, ed. Teresa J. Hornsby and Ken Stone (Semeia Studies 67; Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2011), 45–74. 20  Stuart Macwilliam, Queer Theory and the Prophetic Marriage Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible (London: Routledge, 2014). 21  Macwilliam’s reading links the sexually extravagant and outrageous transgressing of gender-role expectations with the sexual division of labor; see Macwilliam, Queer Theory and the Prophetic Marriage Metaphor.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   75 assumptions. The challenge to the marriage metaphor even extends to the New Testament that uses the metaphor theologically for Jesus Christ and the church. Contextual theologian, Marcella Althaus-Reid, contributed significantly to advancing the indecent position. She demonstrates how to interpret the Hebrew Bible from the perspective of pubis-theology. Claiming the biblical God as a God of history and resurrections, she allows for permutations in biblical interpretation, stating: Permutations are related to genderfucking (gender exchanges) or transsexualism (sexual exchanges) but also to economic processes. Reading God and prostitution in the Scriptures permutes first of all the partners in dialogue from the prostitute and the religious community of sexual authority in the Bible to the prostitute and God. Second, the dialogue is between God and Godself, because Queer theologies consider relationships as the ground from which we think God.22

An indecent queer reading of God’s theophany to Hagar in the wilderness and the narrative of Rahab from the perspective of pubis-theology combines sexual and economic exclusion.23 Some theologians appreciate indecent theology for examining the divine masquerade bolstered by forms of Christian theology. It removes charades that are facades, concealing the full range of expressing the divine. Queer biblical interpretation exposes and unnerves the pretense of dominance, and makes room for other perspectives to be heard. In this way queer biblical readings become a hermeneutic that outwits the socio-political status quo.

Queer as Outwitting A sixth concept that is central in queer biblical studies is the notion of “outwitting” that produces readings that go against engrained readings and promotes alternative meanings. Queer theorists reclaim the notion of outwitting from its original derogatory use to refer to perverse acts. In queer Bible readings, outwitting inverts the word’s original meanings by reversing the insult and by moving from ascribed shame to claimed pride. Queer(y)ing biblical texts signifies the outwitting of heteronormative meanings. The concept enables queer readers to decode biblical normalization when they subvert the supposedly normal textual meaning, reveal it as a construct, and expose the difference from the norm. Outwitting goes beyond restorative projects because queer theory reclaims a broader spectrum of marginal and minority interests. Ironically, “[i]t finds itself curiously central to culture at large, disavowed but necessary for a heterosexual 22  Marcella Althaus-Reid, The Queer God (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2003), 94. 23  Althaus-Reid states: “If the Queer theologian meets Rahab the prostitute at the site of her pubis and reads from the perspective of Sodom, she may find subversion and joy in her own clitoris and that may be the beginning of a pubescent biblical theology, a new disorder of imagining Rahab as part of a community of women prostitutes, where she might find many”; see Althaus-Reid, The Queer God, 106.

76   Jeremy Punt normalcy that defines itself in terms of what it rejects.”24 In this sense, queer outwitting accomplishes more than a reclamation of identity. It goes beyond it. Loughlin describes this strategic focus when he explains: Queer seeks to outwit identity. It serves those who find themselves and others to be other than the characters prescribed by an identity. It marks not by defining, but by taking up a distance from what is perceived as the normative. The term is deployed in order to mark, and to make, a difference, a divergence.25

Many biblical passages illustrate the outwitting of heteronormative readings or “outing the Bible.” For instance, queer interpreters reclaim Isa. 56:1–8 by emphasizing that, in ancient Israel, eunuchs amounted to more than castrated males. This text makes a promise to men that does not endorse their exclusion from communities based on their inability to father children. In fact, the promise to the eunuchs supersedes the otherwise dominant focus on producing children. The text suggests that the promise to eunuchs extends to excluded men and women as they are part of sexual minorities. Since in ancient times eunuchs were subversive go-betweens among the aristocracy or elite, queer interpreters refer to them with contemporary terms, such as “berdache,” “two-spirited,” or “shamans.” Eunuchs turn into queer ancestors of faith for contemporary queer Bible readers.26 The strategy of outwitting offers another exegetical advantage to queer Bible readers. It enables interpreters to resist the mapping of bodies that would create restrictive and oppressive readings. Certain biblical texts are resistant to the notion that desire calls bodies into being and allows their categorization. For instance, Lev. 18:22, one of the socalled six-shooter or clobber texts traditionally used to denigrate lesbigays, does not refer to bodies from the perspective of desire. Instead, it reads from the perspective of the bodies’ sexual use. In a context in which a male penetrated body signifies its feminization and challenges the male-dominated social order, a penetrated male body also confronts discourses of male power. It uncovered the fabricated nature of masculinity and exposed its misogynist premises. Queer(y)ing Lev. 18:22 outwits heteronormativity and its male biases. As Steffan Mathias explains: If Lev. 18.22 is a fear of a disavowal of male phallic power, then an embrace of the rhetoric of the text and of the actual act it prohibits in order to control offers a kind of self-shattering, a rejection of the self, the self which the text and the reader constantly try and protect to regulate and control their relations to others.27 24  Gerard Loughlin, “Introduction: The End of Sex,” in Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body, ed. Gerard Loughlin (Malden, U.K.: Blackwell, 2007), 8. 25  Ibid., 9. 26  Nancy Wilson, Outing the Bible: Queer Folks, God, Jesus, and the Christian Scriptures (Indianapolis, IN: Life Journey, 1995), 88–94, 163–7. 27  Steffan Mathias, “Queering the Body: Un-Desiring Sex in Leviticus,” in The Body in Biblical, Christian and Jewish Texts, ed. Joan E. Taylor (Library of Second Temple Studies 85; London: Bloomsbury, 2014), 37.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   77 Simply put, this reading reclaims passivity as the positive abdication of power. Queer outwitting also moves beyond insider/outsider rhetoric, and resists the writing of texts onto bodies, so common in patriarchal interpretations. Queer interpreters disrecognizes established rhetoric, and resist the textual imposition on bodies. They allow for a critical approach not only to social identity and location but also to social systems and institutions. Queer theory’s outwitting is characterized by its moving away from traditional understandings of identity. It even takes a step away from the unravelling of identity because it does not connect difference to biological, national, or cultural essentialism. Queer outwitting relies on teasing out the intricate intersectionalities because people engage in many diverging discourses, practices, and institutions. Queer outwitting thus plays out in different ways and also shows up in the interpretation history of the Bible, destabilizing the binary self-evidence of power and marginality, center and periphery.

Queer(y)ing Reception Seventh, and finally, queer biblical interpretation history does not romanticize the ancient as a model for the present. Indeed, queer biblical readers function within an academy and amidst scholarship where conventional and heteronormative practices prevail. Queer biblical interpreters perceive with different lenses, re-evaluating and appreciating often from a position of marginality and otherness. The socio-political position of males and heterosexuals create a male-dominated, heterosexual social order that is perceived as normative. They claim that this social order is reflected and justified in biblical texts and traditions. The focus of queer theorists on difference interrogates strategies of marginalization and exclusion that sustain sexist and heteronormative biblical reception.28 While queer theory, emphasizing difference, may disrupt the possibility for political solidarity in LGBTQIA* movements, it also offers the possibility to include and to recognize in its midst the voiceless, the marginalized, and the subordinated, the very basis of which is often race. This political angle of queer work illustrates the importance of social location in queer studies of biblical interpretation history. Social location is not tantamount to personal identity. Although gay men and lesbian women often use queer theory, queer exegesis is not limited to queer readers and their sexual identities and practices of people employing queer hermeneutics. Queer studies destabilize what is considered normal, proper, or heteronormative performances of sex and gender. Still, social location is key in queer biblical interpretation because, as Jennings explains in his interpretation of Saul, Jonathan, 28  Queer biblical interpreters have been accused of eliding both race and class. Such reluctance has been interpreted as oppression, since the abstraction of gay identity from race and class concerns perpetuates white, middle-class dominance. Unfortunately, few scholars of color and differently abled scholars contribute to queer biblical interpretation even today.

78   Jeremy Punt and David, particular constructions of biblical characters depends on the hermeneutical insights of queer interpreters.29 The often stabilizing and normalizing effect of biblical interpretation histories requires more attention in queer exegesis. Queer gender dynamics are at work in textual reception histories. The Song of Songs illustrates this dynamic, starting with allegorical readings by Origen, followed by various Greek and Latin Church Fathers, but dramatically challenged by Martin Luther in the sixteenth century.30 He overturned the allegorical, “queer” readings and fitted them into heteronormative parameters. Stephen Moore explains this dynamic in his characteristically witty fashion, stating: “The ‘literal’ reading of the Song, its reclamation from seventeen centuries of homoerotic exegesis and its transformation into an unmitigated celebration of heterosexual love and lust, is still in its infancy. The carnal interpretation of the Song still awaits its Origen.”31 From a queer(y)ing perspective, the interpretation history of the Song of Songs shows that heteronormative interpretation became dominant and still controls the interpretation of this biblical book. Other biblical texts and their interpretation histories suggest similar developments when exegetes employ a queer(y)ing hermeneutical insights. For instance, the reading of the Sodom and Gomorrah narrative in Genesis 19 demonstrates the importance of studying reception history because it confirms that biblical interpreters never approach texts unencumbered and directly. It becomes clear that an interpreter’s involvement in complex and interrelated networks of meanings are constituted by the text, through the text, and as text. Challenging homophobic and misogynistic meanings, they favor readings advanced in the Jewish rabbinic tradition allowing for broader interpretations.32 Another illustration, from Lamentations, shows how queer readers interpret this book as a resource for handling and even resisting the trauma of HIV and AIDS.33 The queer study of biblical interpretation reception extends to other texts also, and other reading patterns that are sensitive to alternative sexual practices. For instance, Roland Boer discusses sadomasochism by means of an intricately styled dialogue that includes Yahweh featured in the Pentateuch. Similarly, Rowlett’s rereading of the Samson and Delilah narrative also approaches the text from the perspective of sadomasochism.34 All of 29  Theodor W. Jennings, “YHWH as Erastes,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 334; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 36–74. 30 Stephen D. Moore, Bible in Theory: Critical and Postcritical Essays (Resources for Biblical Studies 40; Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2010), 225–45. 31 Moore, Bible in Theory, 245. 32  Michael Carden, “Remembering Pelotit: A Queer Midrash on Calling Down Fire,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 334; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 152–68. 33  Mona West, “The Gift of Voice, the Gift of Tears: A Queer Reading of Lamentations in the Context of AIDS,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 334; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 140–51. 34  Roland Boer, “Yahweh as Top: A Lost Targum,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies, vol. 334; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 75–105; Lory Rowlett, “Violent Femmes and S/M: Queering Samson and Delilah,” in Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Ken Stone (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies, vol. 334; Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 106–15.

Queer Bible Readings in Global Hermeneutical Perspective   79 these queer interpretations challenge the perspective of traditionally heteronormative biblical meanings. In sum, the task of queer(y)ing biblical interpretation history offers fertile possibilities to uncover and to recover biblical meanings that go far beyond the straight-jacket of heteronormativity.

Conclusion Since the early 2000s, queer biblical scholarship has produced at least seven major approaches. They relate to queering and querying biblical texts, queer(y)ing liminality in the deconstruction of biblical sex and gender, unravelling gender identity in the Bible, challenging notions of heteronormativity, indecent queering, outwitting, and reworking interpretation histories. Importantly, the persuasiveness of queer biblical readings depends on its users and their social location. The conviction that heterosexuality is divinely commissioned, biblically underwritten, and thus the social norm has been counterproductive for understanding gender and sex in the Bible. Heterosexism is also detrimental to appreciating the full range of sexualities on the African continent, especially when it is wrapped in the pernicious and mythical claim that homosexuality is un-African and detrimental to African culture. This claim bows rigidly before the heteronormative onslaught from the West. It is dismissive of pre-colonial African heritage and the importance of a range of sexual behaviors and identities across cultural, social, and religious life in African societies. As queer biblical interpreters challenge the content of gender and sex categories, they question the very construction, nature, and use of heterosexist categories and systems of thinking related to sex and gender. Queer ­biblical readings thus connect with studying the various intersectionalities such as ethnicity, race, or class. The value of queer biblical interpretation is situated in redrawing the boundaries and critiquing, that is queer(y)ing, dominant discourse in society and the academy, in particular as it relates to gender and sexuality. Queer interpretation not only holds past readers to account for interpretive conventions, favoring patriarchy or reception histories privileging heteronormativity. It also unravels identities compromised by ideologies which are embedded in biblical texts, embedded not in the archaeological sense of waiting to be discovered but in the social convention sense of the prevailing and pervading influence and effect of language and custom. Queer interpretation is, after all, not only invested in hermeneutical methodology. It also debunks the conventional notion of a stable Bible since the idea of such biblical stability reciprocally serves to strengthen the heteronormative assumptions that contribute to notions of a fixed Bible in traditional biblical scholarship. This broader purview of queer interpretation deals with matters of power and control through sex and gender, and is used with other critical approaches, such as rhetorical, ideological, or postcolonial criticism. In the end, queer biblical exegesis, going beyond reconfiguring boundaries, reconceptualizes the nature, spectrum, and performance of gender and sex in relationship to other intersectional concepts.

80   Jeremy Punt

Bibliography Althaus-Reid, Marcella. Indecent Theology: Theological Perversions in Sex, Gender and Politics. London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2000. Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. Thinking Gender 2. New York, NY: Routledge, 1990. Goss, Robert  E., and Mona West, eds. Take Back the Word: A Queer Reading of the Bible. Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2000. Guest, Deryn, Robert  E.  Goss, Mona West, and Thomas Bohache, eds. The Queer Bible Commentary. London: SCM, 2006. Heacock, Anthony. Jonathan Loved David: Manly Love in the Bible and the Hermeneutics of Sex. Bible in the Modern World 22. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2001. Hornsby, Teresa  J., and Ken Stone, eds. Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship. Semeia Studies 67. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2011. Loughlin, Gerard, ed. Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body. Malden, MA/Oxford U.K./ Carlton, Australia: Blackwell, 2007. Macwilliam, Stuart. Queer Theory and the Prophetic Marriage Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible. London: Routledge, 2014. Stewart, David  T. “LGBT/Queer Hermeneutics and the Hebrew Bible.” Currents in Biblical Research 15.3 (2017): 289–314. Stone, Ken, ed. Queer Commentary and the Hebrew Bible. The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 334. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001.

chapter 6

Qu eer i ng Sacr ed Sexua l Scr ipts for Tr a nsfor m i ng A fr ica n Societies Sarojini Nadar

The Civil Union Act of 2006 makes South Africa one of the few countries on the African continent and in the world that offers legal protection and marriage benefits to same-sex partners.1 Yet the law protects and upholds the civil rights of queer citizens only in limited ways2 because even the most progressive laws are always inadequate when deeply held religious beliefs, especially when they are based on the sacred texts of those religions, challenge legal validity and authority. The Bible of the Christian tradition is a prime example. The ineptitude of the Civil Union Act becomes evident in the wide range of views expressed by South African politicians and theologians about queer sexuality and same-sex relationships. Their opinions range from queer-phobic to queer-affirming beliefs, and they cross political and theological lines. Four examples illustrate the positions upheld by South African politicians and theologians. A first example comes from Jacob Zuma, the former president of South Africa, who asserted that so-called cultural beliefs “require” him to “knock out” gay people. He made the following statement during the Heritage Day Celebrations in Kwadukuza in 2006, stating: “Same sex marriage is a disgrace to the nation and to God. When I was growing up, “ungqingili” [homosexualin isiZulu] could not stand in front of me, I would

1  This essay is based on my inaugural lecture for the position of the Desmond Tutu Research Chair in Religion and Social Justice, delivered at the University of the Western Cape on August 25, 2016. 2  I use the term “queer” as an overarching term to describe people who self-identify as non-gender conforming or lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or intersex (LGBTI) or who in general refuse to conform to sexual and gender normativities (LGBTQI+). There is a long history of subverting the original derogatory use of the term both in activism and academia.

82   Sarojini Nadar knock him out.”3 Another example comes from Mmusi Maimane, the leader of the opposition party called the Democratic Alliance, when he addressed a gathering at Liberty Church in Johannesburg, in 2012. He affirmed that he wanted to “save” gay people when he exclaimed: I really want to be a friend of sinners. That’s part of the mission I believe God has given us: to be a friend of sinners. Because, you know what, I am a sinner. So I guess we can be friends, right? But I don’t want to just be their friend ’cause I want them to think, I’m like, they are like a project. I want them to sincerely know I’m their friend. So, you know what I am most grateful of [sic], is that in my friendship circles there are Muslims, there are gay people—because I believe that is what God has called us to do. I take the verse that Jesus says, “I didn’t come for the well but I came for the sick.” I take that quite seriously.4

Yet another position was articulated by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu who, in 2013, declared that he prefers hell to a homophobic heaven. Speaking at the launch of a gay rights campaign, he stated: “I would not worship a God who is homophobic and that is how deeply I feel about this. I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say, sorry, I mean I would much rather go to the other place.”5 A final example comes from Kenneth Meshoe, the leader of the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP), when he stated that Archbishop Tutu neither respects the Scriptures nor believes in the teaching of the Holy Bible. He demanded in 2013: “We ask Archbishop Tutu not to confuse people who respect the scriptures, and advised him to keep his unbelief to himself if he does not believe in the teaching of the Holy Bible.”6 These four positions illustrate the public conundrum about queer identity and sexuality in South Africa. Unsurprisingly, South African scholars of religion and theology have produced ­considerable research on the contrasting, contradicting, and charged rhetoric about queer sexuality and identity. This research demonstrates the central role of the Bible, the sacred text of the Christian faith traditions, in condemning non-heteronormative sexual expressions. The research also indicates that fundamentalist Christian groups, inspired by the conservative American religious right, are growing in Africa. Those groups believe that homosexuality is “un-African,” although they miss the irony of considering homosexuality as “un-African” when the very adherence to the Bible results from colonialism. South African scholar Thabo Msibi goes even so far as to consider the

3  Available at https://www.news24.com/Archives/City-Press/From-clever-blacks-to-Jesus-JacobZuma-in-quotes-20150429 [accessed February 4, 2019]. 4  Available at https://www.mambaonline.com/2015/05/05/das-maimane-kinda-supports-gaymarriage-despite-anti-gay-church/ [accessed February 4, 2019]. 5  Available at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-23464694 [accessed February 4, 2019]. 6  Available at https://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2013-07-31-meshoe-slams-tutu-about-gayscomment/ [accessed on February 4, 2019].

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   83 Bible “un-African” because fundamentalist African Christians quote the Bible in support of their homophobic positions.7 Notwithstanding Msibi’s dismissal of the Bible as “un-African” and the obvious irony of its use in promoting queer-phobia in Africa, the fact remains that the Bible is a main source text in the litany of condemnations of queer sexuality and identity. As such, the Bible remains an important “site of struggle”8 for socially engaged scholars. In other words, those of us who consider ourselves activist-academics engage the Bible to challenge and to promote more life-affirming sexual norms in our effort to support people with diverse sexual and gender identities. This commitment is based on significant research. It suggests that religious and cultural conceptualizations of sex and gender differences limit sexual freedoms for sexual minorities with the goal of protecting the hetero-normative model of the family. Even in transforming contexts, such as South Africa, that have legally progressive constitutions, many people of different faith persuasions argue that the religiously and culturally sanctioned hetero-normative family receives preferential protection by the State, under the guise of constitutional protection of religious and cultural beliefs. Sometimes this constitutional contradiction translates into a “don’t touch me on my religious and cultural beliefs” phenomenon, preventing meaningful engagement with religious or cultural beliefs. Socially engaged biblical scholars thus maintain that those belief systems (and their source texts) must be systematically and critically reflected upon. These beliefs about sex and text are often left un-interrogated because they are believed to be “sacred”—hence the reference in the title of this chapter— sacred sex and sacred text. I use the term sacred in a “Durkheimian”9 way to describe beliefs about sex and the text, in a way that recognizes these as set apart for or devoted exclusively to one purpose—in the case of sex, its sacredness lies in its sanctification or reservation of the physical genital encounter between opposite sexes,10 and in the case of the text, its sacredness lies in its authority to be “God’s word” which sets norms and rules for how people ought to live their lives—and defines what is sacred and “right sex” as indicated below. 7  Thabo Msibi, “The Lies We Have Been Told: On (Homo) Sexuality in Africa,” Africa Today 58 (2011): 55–77. 8  For an explanation of the phrase “site of struggle,” see Gerald West, “Redaction Criticism as a Resource,” Old Testament Essays 30.2 (2017): 525–45. 9  David Chidester explains this Durkeimian sense of the term “sacred,” stating in Wild Religion: Tracking the Sacred in South Africa (Berkeley / Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 2012), 5: “In the study of religion, the sacred has been defined as both supremely transcendental and essentially social, as an otherness transcending the ordinary world . . . following Émile Durkheim’s understanding of the sacred as that which is set apart from the ordinary daily rhythms of life, but set apart in such a way that it stands at the centre of community formation. In between the radical transcendence of the sacred and the social dynamics of the sacred, we find ongoing mediations, at the intersections of personal subjectivity and social collectivities, in which anything can be sacralized through the religious work of intensive interpretation, regular ritualization, and inevitable contestation over ownership of the means, modes and forces for producing the sacred.” 10  I agree with the body of literature that redefines sex as “holy” rather than “profane.” However, I use the term to denote exclusiveness to the heterosexual encounter rather than in the wider sense of sex as a spiritual experience.

84   Sarojini Nadar On February 26, 2014, Ludovica Iaccino reports the following in the International Business Times: Uganda’s Right Reverend Father Simon Lokodo has claimed that heterosexual rape is preferable to homosexual intercourse and said child rape is “natural.” Lokodo, who is the current State Minister for Ethics and Integrity in Uganda and claims to have several degrees in theology, considers himself a good Christian who defends his country from the threat of homosexuality. He expressed his controversial views during an interview with English comedian, actor, writer, presenter and activist, Stephen Fry, who is himself gay. When asked whether homosexuality was worse than heterosexual child rape, Lokodo responded: “Let them do it . . . as long as it is in the right way.”11

The interview and Fry’s account of what the minister said caused an uproar among human rights activists. In Fry’s words: I said “That was on camera. Do you know that was on camera?” He said “Yes.” I said “Can you just explain what you meant?” “Well, it is men raping girls. Which is natural.” On the online comments thread to the article a reader asks: “Where does this minister get these absurd ideas from?” This is an excellent question. A well-known scholar and theorist on sexualities in Africa, Sylvia Tamale, explains the origins of these kinds of ideas when she writes: [T]he current homophobic upsurge and the legal winds of recriminalization of same-sex relations that are sweeping across the African continent, from Dakar to Djibouti and from Cairo to Cape Town, are not coincidental, nor are they mere happenstance. Recent history has connected the religious and politically-inspired homophobia in African states to renewal evangelical movements (aligned with the neoconservative right) in the United States.12

In short, the combination of homophobic convictions within fundamentalist Christian movements across the continents of Africa and America reinforces homophobic policies and views in many African countries, including in South Africa. These convictions are inspired by interpretations of sacred texts which govern norms for sexuality. 11  Ludovica Iaccino, “Ugandan Reverend Simon Lokodo: ‘Child Rape Better than Homosexuality,’ ” International Business Times (February 26, 2014); available at http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ugandanreverend-simon-lokodo-child-rape-better-homosexuality- video-1437976 [accessed January 31, 2019]. 12  Sylvia Tamale, “Exploring the Contours of African Sexualities: Religion, Law and Power,” African Human Rights Law Journal 14.1 (2014): 166. Speaking specifically of Uganda, Thabo Msibi notes: “Evangelical organizations, which are thriving throughout Uganda, have been instrumental, not only in initiating homophobic sentiments, but also in spreading them”; see Msibi, The Lies We Have Been Told, 59.

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   85 This essay examines how various sexual scripts constitute lay and scholarly readings of Judges 19. Scripts that align with heteronormative sexuality not only promote discrimination but they also encourage violence against queer bodies, an outcome which is expected from readings within such a framework. However, even scripts that are queer affirming rely on violence against the original queer sex—woman—as they, too, assert the notion that biblical texts are not about queer and specifically homosexual relations. Rather, these scripts are produced within a framework of masculinity that defines masculinity as vile, violent, or inviolable. The essay examines these issues in three main sections. It explains sexual-scripting theory and its usefulness for the examination of this particular topic. It then explores the three scripts of masculinities, namely vile masculinities, violent masculinities, and inviolable masculinities, as they appear in lay and scholarly readings of Judges 19. It also proposes an alternative feminist script that re-inscribes the body of the original queer sex—woman—to more authentically queer the biblical text.

Explaining Sexual Scripting and Its Usefulness for Biblical Interpretation I use sexual scripting as an approach for understanding how lay and scholarly interpretations of Judges 19 draw on the scripts, as they exist within and outside of the biblical text, to construct meanings about gender identity and sexuality. The theory about sexual scripting originates with John Gagnon and William Simon who developed it in 1973.13 They explain that sexual scripting is “a conceptual apparatus with which to examine development and experience of the sexual.” Yet nowadays the approach is understood more broadly as “cognitive schema that instruct people how to understand and act in sexual situations. They [these scripts] operate on cultural, interpersonal, and intrapersonal levels.”14 The value of this broader understanding of sexual scripting is that it highlights how lay and scholarly interpretations of biblical texts adhere to scripts that view “sacred sex” through mutually constructed operations of power at the cultural, interpersonal, and intrapersonal levels. The idea of sexual scripting is therefore a helpful analytical tool for understanding how biblical interpretations produce and sustain heteronormative and heterosexist beliefs that prescribe the limits of sacred sex. As Sylvia Tamale states: Historically, all over Africa, the “truth regimes” about sexuality are largely penned by the nib of legislation, custom and religion. The “master frames” (or scripts) of 13  John Gagnon and William Simon, Sexual Conduct: The Social Sources of Human Sexuality (Chicago, IL: Aldine, 1973). 14  Tatiana N. Masters, Erin Casey, Elizabeth A. Wells, and Diane M. Morrison, “Sexual Scripts among Young Heterosexually Active Men and Women: Continuity and Change,” Journal of Sex Research 50.5 (2013): 409–20.

86   Sarojini Nadar sexuality that law, culture and religion construct for African people push many who do not conform, to the very margins of society–sex workers, rape survivors, the youth, homosexuals, widows, single mothers, people living with HIV, and so forth. Their bodies become sites for political inscription even as they are constituted as the sexual “other.”15

In this sense, sexual scripts are “truth regimes” about sexuality constructed at the ­cultural, interpersonal, and intrapersonal levels. The following sections on the various scripts on masculinity explain how lay and scholarly interpretations of Judges 19 produce such truth regimes. It will become clear that they do not only result from flawed textual analysis but they also rely on limited sexual analysis. The latter assumes fixed and stable definitions of gender, especially in regard to masculinity and femininity. As a result, lay and scholarly biblical interpreters have little problem in textually violating the body of the woman to achieve their theopolitical ends. They tolerate proposed or enacted sexual violence against the female characters in Judges 19 to uphold male supremacy, whether it is defined as heteronormative or queer.

Scripts of Vile Masculinities The first of three pervasive and highly oppressive scripts on masculinity collude with the patriarchal sexual script. They justify sexual violence against women as the lesser of two evils. Its goal is to eliminate sexual acts with men, especially sexual violence against men, from the imaginary because they regard such acts as “vile masculinities.” An example is a sermon by Pastor Roger Jimenez of Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento, California, which he preached on the Sunday after the Saturday night killings in the Pulse gay nightclub in the United States. The sermon clearly illustrates the script of vile masculinities. Pastor Jimenez’s theological explanations make the connection between homophobic practices and fundamentalist Christian convictions. Sylvia Tamale observes correctly that this kind of right-wing rhetoric fuels homophobic sentiments that African political leaders, such as the Ugandan minister of ethics and integrity, also make in their respective settings. It is thus worthwhile to look at the American pastor who offers a “biblical response” to the Orlando shootings, stating: I would like to teach you the biblical response to events like what happened last night. . . . As Christians we should not be mourning the death of 50 Sodomites . . . . Why? Because the bible teaches that every single one of the sodomites is a ­predator. . . . People say, “Well, aren’t you sad that 50 sodomites died?” Here's the problem with that, it’s like the equivalent of asking me, “Well, aren’t you sad that 50 paedophiles were killed today?” Um no. I think that’s great. I think that helps 15  Tamale, “Exploring the Contours of African Sexualities,” 158.

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   87 society. I think Orlando, Florida, is a little safer tonight. The tragedy is that more of them didn’t die. The tragedy is I’m kind of upset he didn’t finish the job—because these people are predators. They are abusers . . . if God puts the death penalty on it God says they deserve to die, and when they die this is not something as Christians we need to be mourning.16

Shockingly, Pastor Jimenez wishes for additional murders in the name of God. Then he reflects on Judges 19, making several references to Genesis 19. He explains that “the bible paints a picture that these [‘the Sodomites’] are wicked people.” He rationalizes the murderous shooting in a Florida gay club with a script on vile masculinity when he characterizes the murdered men as “predators,” “abusers,” and “pedophiles.” In his view, they deserved to die as God’s punishment for their sexual sins. The story of Judges 19 is aptly known as a “text of terror.”17 It is gruesome. A man offers his young daughter and his guest’s concubine to be raped instead of his male guest. Reminiscent of Genesis 19, the story about Sodom and Gomorrah, the tale in Judges 19 differs in one crucial point. Whereas Lot’s daughters are not raped, the concubine of Judges 19 is gang-raped to her death. The story ends with the proposition: “Consider it, take counsel and speak out.” Pastor Jimenez considers the story extensively and then takes counsel by “speaking out” against modern-day Sodomites. This Christian minister endorses the notion that the shot and murdered men deserved to die. It is interesting that this Christian fundamentalist preacher produces a sexual script about profane sex not on the basis of the rape of the concubine but on the basis of the perceived sex between men. His only excuse, offered in a fleeting sentence about the man and Lot offering up their daughters and concubine, is that “those who live in a society where there is perverseness about them . . . they begin to think in perverted ways.” Then the preacher quickly moves onto the “vileness” of the proposed rape of the men. He explains that, in his belief, God chooses “throughout the bible” to describe the act of sex between men as “vile.” Pastor Jimenez’s interpretation of Judges 19 is limited to the perceived “abomination” of potential sex between men. The counsel he takes from the biblical tale is that “Sodomites” deserve to die. Similar to the minister of ethics and integrity from Uganda, Pastor Jimenez propagates the idea that heterosexual rape is preferable to any other form of same-sex consensual sex. This kind of sermon as well as many other publications about biblical teachings use Judges 19 to articulate God’s disapproval of homosexuality. They affirm this biblical story as sacred to define heteronormative sex as “normal” and “un-perverted.” It is sacred and thus set apart for encounters only between women and men. This is the “right way” of having sex, and so interpreters praise the old man in Judges 19 when he explains offering his daughters: “No, my brothers, do not act so wickedly. Since this man is my guest, do not do this vile thing. Here are my virgin daughter 16  See https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/06/14/pastor-refuses-tomourn-orlando-victims-the-tragedy-is-that-more-of-them-didnt-die/ [accessed January 31, 2019]. 17  Phyllis Trible, Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives (Overtures to Biblical Theology; Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1984).

88   Sarojini Nadar and his concubine; let me bring them out now. Ravish them and do whatever you want to them; but against this man do not do such a vile thing” (Judg. 19:23–24). Many interpreters make the same interpretive move for Lot in Genesis 19 as he offers his two daughters to the mob (Gen. 19:7–8). In other words, when interpreters define “sacred sex” as heteronormative sex, the “vile thing” is not the daughters’ rape, proposed by their father, but the possibility of sexual intercourse between the men. It is the “vile thing,” in their mind.

Scripts of Violent Masculinities The second sexual script on “scripts of violent masculinities” frowns upon rape, but it keeps essentialized ideas about rape intact. In other words, rape is here seen as an overtly masculine act, and it is part of a culture of violent masculinities. While rape must be understood within the context of violent masculinities, this violence is not just physical or sexual but also textual. It is part of the wider discursive practices that constitute “rape culture.”18 Feminist exegete J. Cheryl Exum explains this dynamic when she talks about the hierarchy of violations in Judges 19. She calls the female character Batshever (the daughter of breaking) who, according to Exum, is also “raped by the pen.” Accordingly, the textual rape relates to the dominance of the male gaze. Exum explains this ­connection stating: Raped by the pen is not the same as raped by the penis . . . . [Consider] two different kinds of textual rape: rape that is recounted in a narrative and rape that takes place by means of a narrative . . . . My primary interest in the comparison is to see how women are portrayed in texts where they are the objects of sexual aggression and to inquire how women’s bodies are focalised in these texts; that is to investigate women as the object of the male gaze.19

Exum focuses on the rape by focusing the women as the biblical text depicts them. She notices that women are the objects of its male gaze. Unsurprisingly, other biblical scholars dispute Exum’s sympathetic analysis of the female character. They do not understand that rape culture is perpetuated in their discursive practice. For instance, South African Bible scholar, Douglas Lawrie, disagrees with Exum when he maintains: “Female characters are manipulated—not raped—by the pen, because they are ‘promising material’ for an author who wishes to evoke shock and disgust. Often, we forgive or overlook such manipulation because all authors, do, to

18  D. Herman, “The Rape Culture,” Culture 1.10 (1988): 45–53; Emilie Buchwald, Pamela R. Fletcher, and Martha Roth, eds., Transforming Rape Culture (Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed Editions, 1993). 19 Exum, Fragmented Women, 135–62.

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   89 some extent, ‘exploit’ their characters.”20 Similarly, Jimenez finds in the Levite’s concubine “promising material” to evoke shock and disgust not only about what happens to her body but also about the possibility of male-on-male sex. The focal point of Jimenez’s male gaze is sex between two men. My reading offers yet a third way to engage Exum’s important point about the sexual script of violent masculinity in Judges 19. In entrenching the focal gaze on the men and their violence, I suggest that the un-named concubine is not just raped by the pen but also raped in the pulpit, as so many preachers omit focusing on her broken body. She becomes dispensable and peripheral to the preaching plot, as the threatened male-onmale rape dominates the ecclesial imagination. Thus, the sexual script of many sermons turns the female character, Batshever, into the supporting actress for the ecclesial production of sacred sexuality. She is “out-scripted” and only “in-scripted” in so far as she demonstrates the enormity of the possible crime, homosexual rape, against the male Levite. Unfortunately, queer theorists do not offer a much kinder sexual script for the female character of Judges 19. They emphasize that the men are threatened to be “feminized” by sexual penetration. For instance, Ken Stone states: While discussions of this scene have long been tied up with evaluations of same-sex sexual contact among later readers, it is important to note that the kind of phallic aggression represented here has little to do with modern conceptions of homosexuality. In the socio-cultural context of the ancient Mediterranean and near Eastern world, sexual penetration symbolizes unequal power relations. Thus the public rape of one male by another constitutes a powerful semiotic mechanism humiliating the raped man in the eyes of the other men by making of him a sexual object.21

While Stone defends the “masculine prerogative to sexual subjectivity”22 and the threat of “phallic aggression” with a historical argument as a means for queering his interpretation of Judges 19, he affirms the sexual script in which the male appears as the “real victim of masculinity.” Some feminist thinkers give considerable thought to the problematic stances taken in traditional androcentric and queer-affirming interpretations of Judges 19. They locate the problem within critical masculinity studies. For instance, Melanie McCarry, a feminist theorist, explains that critical masculinity studies offer only limited understanding of male violence. In her view, one of the drawbacks of the upsurge of masculinity studies

20  Douglas Lawrie. “Outrageous Terror and Trying Texts: Restoring Human Dignity in Judges 19–21,” in Juliana L. Claassens and Bruce C. Birch, eds., Restorative Readings: The Old Testament, Ethics, and Human Dignity (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2015), 44. 21  Ken Stone, Practicing Safer Texts: Food, Sex and Bible in Queer Perspective (New York, NY: T&T Clark International, 2005), 79–80. 22  Caroline Blyth, The Narratives of Rape in Genesis 34: Interpreting Dinah’s Silence (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2010), 73.

90   Sarojini Nadar is “that men are constructed as the real victims of masculinity.”23 By portraying the Levite and Lot’s guests as “the real victims of masculinity” in queer discourse, many androcentric and queer-affirming readers sacrifice the female characters. In fact, they collude with the patriarchal sexual script, failing to recognize that even queer men benefit from the patriarchal dividend and that violated masculinity does not equal violated femininity.

Scripts of Inviolable Masculinity The third sexual script offers yet another pernicious heteronormative and androcentric view on masculinity. It maintains that men cannot be raped, and so interpreters must do everything to disallow this possibility. Many interpretations of Judges 19 follow this script. They readily sacrifice the female body to ensure that the masculinity of the Levite man is not violated. As a result, many readers offer little hermeneutical resistance to the concubine’s rape and murder. Instead they explain away the horror she endures. For instance, some readers view the vileness as a lack of “hospitality,”24 and so they excuse the fathers of Judges 19 and Genesis 19—the old man or Lot—for offering the concubine and daughters. Some interpreters debate in great detail the legality of the hospitality code and so obscure the potential rape of Lot’s daughters through extensive discussion. For instance, Victor H. Matthews maintains: The only problem with this seemingly perfect example of the code is that Lot has no right to offer these strangers hospitality. It would be different if Lot was in his own encampment, in front of his own tent (as Abraham is in Gen 18:1; Van Nieuwenhuijze: 701). However, he is sitting in the gate of Sodom and he is not a citizen of that city. He is a resident alien (ger), and therefore cannot represent the city in this matter. The legal principle regarding the transient stranger is one of reciprocity between individuals and groups. When a town is involved, however, it is the obligation of a citizen of that town to offer these individuals hospitality (Van Nieuwenhuijze: 287). But this obligation has been usurped here by Lot.25

23  Melanie McCarry, “Masculinity Studies and Male Violence: Critique or Collusion?,” Women’s Studies International Forum 30.5 (2007): 404–15. McCarry also criticizes masculinity studies when she explains “that masculinity becomes disembodied from men and as such masculinity becomes problematized instead of the practices of men; and that despite the alleged alignment with feminism the male masculinity theorists are often not reflexive about their work in terms of both political and personal commitments.” 24  Victor H. Matthews, “Hospitality and Hostility in Genesis 19 and Judges 19,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 22.1 (1992): 3–11; David Penchansky, “Staying the Night: Intertextuality in Genesis and Judges,” in Reading between Texts: Intertextuality and the Hebrew Bible, ed. Danna Nolan Fewell (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox, 1992), 77–88. 25  Matthews, “Hospitality and Hostility,” 4.

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   91 Matthews maintains that Lot does not have full legal authority to offer hospitality because he is only a resident alien and not a full citizen of Sodom. He excuses the male character of Genesis 19. This position is also assumed in some queer readings. For instance, a South African organization called “Inclusive and Affirming Ministries (IAM)” that promotes queeraffirming interpretations of the Bible refers to Genesis 19. It states the importance of hospitality in ancient Israel as an explanation for the father’s proposal when it explains: In the time of Lot there were strict rules that applied to hospitality. It was very important to treat visitors to your house in such a way that they did not become enemies. These hospitality rules required that you had to protect your visitors at all cost, even if it were at your own expense. Taking this into consideration Lot took an honourable and responsible action in protecting his visitors, when he offered his daughters to the men of Sodom for sex, see also Judges 19.26

While this queer resource also emphasizes that the biblical narratives do not depict God as rejecting homosexuality but as rejecting homosexual rape, this position nevertheless is willing to sacrifice the bodies of the female characters, namely the two daughters and the concubine. Thus, the queer-affirming group still advances a rather sexist position. They tolerate that the women are offered to the men of Sodom for sex, which they do not define as rape, and they find this offer honorable in the context of the hospitality customs prevalent at the time. Yet all of these hermeneutical efforts are useless when one follows the historical argumentation. When we understand the rape and murder of the woman within the ancient context, the crime is not committed against the individual woman but against her male master, the Levite. This historical situation indicates that the Levite’s masculinity is violated when his concubine is raped and murdered. She is his representative and what happens to her happens to him. Some interpreters, in fact, make this argument. For instance, Ken Stone explains the depicted activities of the Levite man in Judges 20 when he states: We may well wonder whether the outrage expressed by the Levite in Judges 20 is grounded in care and compassion for his murdered concubine or whether, in fact, he is not responding angrily to a situation in which he feels dishonoured by the brutal treatment of his property. It is important to note how the Levite describes the situation to his fellow Israelites: the inhabitants of Gibeah rose up against me, and surrounded me, in the house at night intending to kill me, and they abused my concubine and she died.27

Stone makes an important observation about the Levite’s explanations in Judg. 20:4–7. The male Levite emphasizes that he is the violated character in the events and not his 26  “Journey with God: Focusing on Sexuality and Spirituality”; available at http://iam.org.za/ wp-content/uploads/2016/03/IAM-Biblestudy-Journey-with-God.pdf [accessed August 1, 2016]. 27 Stone, Practicing Safer Texts, 81.

92   Sarojini Nadar woman. He exclaims that everything happened to “me, me, me!” In other words, in the historical context of the story the male character is at the center of the crime committed to his woman. In sum, it is safe to observe that not only homophobic or queer interpretations reinforce the male gaze, but the text itself depicts the sexual violence against the female character as a crime perpetrated against the man. He is the sexually violated character. Perhaps for this reason Judges 19 and Genesis 19 have disturbed the homophobic and androcentric imaginary for so long. The Bible itself promotes the sexual script on the inviolability of the masculine. Overall then, the scripts of vile masculinities, violent masculinities, and inviolable masculinities that homophobic and queer readers reinforce in their interpretations of Judge 19 indicate that threatened or executed sexual violence always portrays men as the ultimate victims of masculinity. Thus, these scripts collude with unjust gender power relations and they do not adequately critique them. Moreover, the sexual scripts of masculinities do not only endorse homophobia but they also promote sexual violence against women. They tolerate and even accept the dismembered body of the concubine in Judges 19. Clearly, we must find viable, just, and feminist alternative sexual scripts. Yet the challenge is how to re-member Batshever’s body, how to give voice to her perspective, and how to imagine what she would say to those who do not conform to heteropatriarchy and heterosexist ways of being in the world. The following section presents such an alternative script that speaks from the remembered Batshever in the genre of an imaginary interview.

Re-scripting by Re-inscribing the “Queer Sex” sn: Batshever, what an ordeal you have been through! I feel privileged as a twenty-firstcentury woman who identifies as a South African feminist scholar to speak with you. I believe your ordeal has probably taught you so much. I can only imagine the pain and the anger that you must feel. Would you please share some of your reflections with us? batshever: You are damn right I am angry! I am angry at so many things, but let’s begin with the sermon that you mentioned earlier, given by that guy from the U.S.A. and all his cronies. How dare he and all his ilk establish what they think are God’s rules about men having sex with men, through my dis-membered body! sn: Yes, Batshever, I am sorry you were raped by the pen, as Cheryl Exum pointed out. Indeed, you continue to be raped at the pulpit each time the focus is turned to men who essentially step over your violated body. batshever: Yes, men keep writing these scripts, don’t they? We need new scripts, you know! sn: Yes, indeed, we do, but what might those new scripts look like? batshever: Well, we need transgressive feminist sexuality scripts. sn: Excuse me, what?

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   93 batshever: Yeah, yeah, I know. You are shocked that I know the “f ” word! Listen, just because we didn’t use the word feminist back then, doesn’t mean we didn’t practice it! I was shocked to discover that the King James Version of the Bible, used by Pastor Jimenez, states: “And his concubine played the whore against him, and went away from him unto her father’s house to Bethlehem, Judah, and was there four whole months.” “Played the whore?” Isn’t that exactly how all women who act autonomously are judged? sn: Yes, indeed. Gale Yee, a contemporary feminist biblical scholar, picked up on this point a few years ago when she mentioned your feminist act of transgressive action: “It is her very abandonment of her husband that the Deuteronomist describes as “fornicating” against her husband . . . . [D]isrupting the household by vacating it abruptly is one of a number of strategies women adopt to exercise autonomy in androcentric societies. In a society that so rigorously supervises the sexuality of its women, the daring act of leaving a husband would be judged, as the Deuteronomist does in this case, as a metaphoric act of “fornication.”28 So what you were doing was being transgressive? batshever: Yes! My act of leaving was considered an act of adultery. And please note, if I did not “play the whore” I would have not been allowed to return to my father’s house. Instead, I would have been stoned to death and my husband, my master, the very religious Levite from the priestly class, would not have come to speak tenderly to me and to woo me back. My act of leaving was certainly frowned upon, but not unexpected, as I did not quite fit the norm of the submissive wife! My Levite husband was often ashamed when he was asked: “who is the man in this relationship?” sn: Yes! Women who choose to be in same-sex partnerships today are asked the same question aren’t they? One of my masters-level students refers in her thesis, entitled “Who’s in Charge in a Genderless Marriage,” to an incident that illustrates this point well. During a debate over same-sex marriage between the late Steve de Gruchy, a South African liberation theologian, a young man asked who is in charge in light of the Apostle Paul’s position in 1 Corinthians 11 in which Paul declares Christ to be the head of the Church as every husband is the head of his wife. In his question the young man assumed that power resides in the male gender of the husband. However, he ignored the possibility of marriage between two husbands or two wives. Who is in charge then? Mpho Tutu van Furth who married her partner in May 2016 released a press statement on her decision to surrender her license in which she responded to the question of who the man is in her relationship with another woman. She explained that the culturally accepted power differential is embedded in the question. A questioner assumes that the normative is heterosexuality. Several other questions are subsumed in this assumption. Among them are: Who stays at home? Who is responsible for cooking and cleaning? Who has primary responsibility for child-rearing and elder care? Who is the primary breadwinner? Who is the head of the household? In the South African context two additional questions may be added: Who can have multiple sexual partners (in or out of wedlock) and who gets to be drunk and violently abusive to his partner with little fear of religious sanction and no cultural consequence? Tutu Van Furth also explained: My wife is a pediatrician and a professor of pediatric infectious diseases at the Vrije University Medical Center in Amsterdam. I am the Executive Director of 28  Gale A. Yee, “Ideological Criticism: Judges 17–21 and the Dismembered Body,” in Judges and Method: New Approaches in Biblical Studies, ed. Gale A. Yee (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1992), 153.

94   Sarojini Nadar the Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation in Cape Town. We have decided that we both will be the women in the relationship. We meet as mutually respectful equals who enjoy working and who enjoy working together. Neither of us stays home. Both of us enjoy cooking, we share responsibility for cleaning and employ domestic workers.29 batshever: Wow! So Mpho Tutu van Furth’s marriage invites us to consider radical gender equality scripts. To have two “women” in the relationship, that means nobody is in charge! sn: Yes, but only if you are willing to move out of the essentialized script of who a woman is. Don’t be fooled, Batshever, even same-sex relationships can be very violent if the partners subscribe to traditional gender roles, in which one sees themselves as male and the other as female. The irony is that both the systems of patriarchy and equality require a gender binary to sustain its arguments. Either there is a hierarchy between the sexes or there is equality between the sexes. Mpho Tutu’s reflections brings this binary up for scrutiny. “We have decided that we will both be the women in the relationship.” This calls into question the stable category of “woman.” It invites us, as Judith Butler30 and others explain, to consider the instability not only of the binary but also of the very categories of “woman.” batshever: Yes, I can see the problem of essentialized ideas about gender. What we need are non-binary embodied and intersectional scripts. Since I came to your context, I have been fascinated by the story of Caster Semenya. By the way I was thrilled by her win in Rio on August 21, 2016. I felt so proud I could have easily been mistaken for being South African! I am fascinated by the public’s obsession with Caster’s body. As someone who has had the most horrendous forms of violence done to my own body, I identify with the pain she must have experienced at having her body being used to define and regulate what a woman’s body should look like and how a woman’s body should perform. When that body is a black body, the analysis is rendered even more complex. My own body was violated in the way it was because of the understanding that a male body should not and cannot be penetrated, as if our body parts define our identities and as if our body parts can only be sanctified for singular uses. Someone once said mouths are meant for eating and not oral sex! The understanding that we are either male or female with no consideration that gender falls on a spectrum is where the problem lies. Recently, I watched a BBC documentary interview with Caster. She comments there: The way you were born is the way you were born . . . . Nothing can change it. I’ve got a deep voice. I know. I might look tough but what are you going to do? Do you think you can change it? No. If someone was born the way she was born, are you going to blame him or are you going to blame God? Whose fault is that? Nobody’s. 29  Biénne Huisman, “Tutu Forced to Quit over Gay Marriage”; available at https://city-press.news24. com/News/tutu-forced-to-quit-over-gay-marriage-20160521 [accessed May 22, 2016]. 30  Judith Butler, Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex (New York, NY: Routledge Classics, 2011).

Queering Sacred Sexual Scripts for Transforming   95 sn: Exactly! And I am sure she uses mixed pronouns deliberately. They are not accidental. batshever: Yes, indeed, Caster’s controversial body, my erased body, and the raped and violated bodies of the women in South Africa, such as Eudy Simelane, remind us that the (female) body is not a means to an end but an end in itself. It also tells us that the (female) body is not a “necessary evil” but a gift from God. And as a theologian I want to add that the “wounded and violated bodies” of women like myself, can be read in juxtaposition with the “wounded and violated body” of Christ. The wounds of Christ, like my own body, are “glossed over” in traditional christologies because the wounds rather than real bodies are linked to the salvation for sins. As Megan Mckenna explains: “To say that Jesus died for our sins is only half a theology, it is to forget that he was executed because he was dangerous to a society that wanted to hold onto its power.” sn: And power is at the heart of this debate! Thank you Batshever. I am so glad we brought your voice into our script today although your body has been erased from  it.

Re-writing the Script: About the Future Task of Feminist Biblical Interpreters The re-imagination or even the re-writing of sexual scripts is a complex task. Apart from the fact that religious and cultural norms and texts render sexuality “sacred,” the complexity also derives from power differentials that accompany gender identity and sexual orientation. Hence, the theoretical task of “queering” homophobic interpretations cannot be left to the discipline of queer studies or masculinity studies alone. Three scripts of vile, violent, and inviolable masculinities show that these scripts unwittingly align themselves with popular homophobic biblical readings. They identify with the male characters and protect them from violence by tolerating the violation of women instead of the men. They also consider violence against women as the lesser evil of male gay sex or rape. Most importantly, they erase women’s violated bodies from the scripts they construct. This essay illustrated the three scripts on masculinity with lay and scholarly interpretations of Judges 19, showing that theoretical choices have practical consequences, resulting in rape culture. The imagined conversation between the sexually violated and murdered woman in Judges 19 whom Exum names Bathshever offers us alternative scripts. Unquestionably, feminist biblical interpreters must compose many other stories and interviews about women in the Bible that do not advance sexual scripts harmful to women and men. We must compose viable, just, and feminist alternative sexual scripts to offer inclusive ways of reading, writing, and imagining biblical stories for a world without sexual violence.

96   Sarojini Nadar

Bibliography Althaus-Reid, Marcella, ed. Liberation Theology and Sexuality. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006. Bongmba, Elias Kifon. “Homosexuality, Ubuntu, and Otherness in the African Church.” Journal of Religion and Violence 4.1 (2016): 15–37. Cheng, Patrick. Radical Love: An Introduction to Queer Theology. New York, NY: Seabury Books, 2011. Phiri, Lily, and Nadar Sarojini. “To Move or Not to Move! Queering Borders and Faith in the Context of Diverse Sexualities in Southern Africa.” In Borderland Religion: Ambiguous Practices of Difference, Hope and Beyond, ed. Daisy  L.  Machado, Bryan  S.  Turner, and Trygve E. Wyller. New York, NY: Routledge, 2018. Van Klinken, Adriaan. “The Homosexual as the Antithesis of ‘Biblical Manhood’? Heteronormativity and Masculinity Politics in Zambian Pentecostal Sermons.” Journal of Gender and Religion in Africa 17.2 (2011): 129–42. Van Klinken, Adriaan, and Ezra Chitando, eds. Public Religion and the Politics of Homosexuality in Africa. New York, NY: Routledge, 2016. Zethu, Matebeni, ed. Reclaiming Afrikan: Queer Perspectives on Sexual and Gender Identities. Cape Town: Modjaji, 2014.

chapter 7

The Dem a n d to Listen to Kor ea n “Comfort Wom en ” a n d to T wo Biblica l Wom en Yani Yoo

Only a few hundred Korean “comfort women” survived the brutal sexual enslavement by the Japanese Imperial Army before and during the Second World War. An estimated 200,000 girls, who were as young as 11 years, and young women were forced into sexual slavery. Although most of them were Korean, some of the women and girls were Chinese, Filipino, Indonesian, Burmese, Vietnamese, Thai, Malaysian, Taiwanese, and even Dutch. About two-thirds of the victims died before the end of the war. Survivors started coming out only in 1991, and even today they have not yet been properly heard. They have yet to receive justice. This essay reads 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 from the perspective of comfort women and all the other women who live under sexually abusive and violent oppression. Public conversation on the fate of comfort women during the Second World War have begun in South Korea only recently. It required former comfort women to speak out decades later, remembering the tremendous pain, death, and suffering they experienced and witnessed. About twenty years ago, one of them, Yil Chool Kang, drew a painting entitled “Girls Being Burnt.”1 The painting depicts a scene of her ordeal after she had 1  A volunteer man at the House of Sharing, Cho Jung-rae, was shocked to see the painting in 2002. He was a movie director and made up his mind to put the tragedy of the survivors into a movie as cultural evidence. Several Korean conservative politicians threatened him not to make the movie. However, crowd funding and volunteer actresses and actors made it possible for the movie, “Spirit’s Homecoming,” to come out in 2016. The first viewers were the survivors at the House of Sharing. Contrary to the concerns of the director, they wanted to see the movie, commenting on the various scenes throughout the screening of the movie. After the movie one of the survivors stated: “Not even one 100th of my experiences was expressed in the movie.” For the full interview, see http://www. newsen.com/news_view.php?uid=201709051535226710 [accessed September 15, 2018].

98   Yani Yoo become sick with Typhoid fever at the “comfort station.” She and ten sick girls were ordered to get onto a truck. The soldiers told them they would receive medical treatment, but the truck stopped somewhere in the mountains. Kang saw armed soldiers around a fire pit. When she came closer, she saw a dozen women burnt in a fire pit. She understood that she and the other sick girls were brought here only to be burnt in the fire pit. Japanese military dealt with girls in this way when they were not “useful” anymore. Some women in the pit were still alive. Several girls from Kang’s group were shot and thrown into the pit. Miraculously, a battle began and one soldier saved Kang’s life. More than fifty and even sixty years after the horrendous experiences of rape, sexual violence, and death did the surviving comfort women speak. Why did Korean politicians and leaders not listen to them earlier or take their experiences of pain and suffering into account when they made reconciliatory agreements with Japan after the war? This essay presents a literary reading of a famous biblical story to demonstrate how its meaning shifts when the women become the center of the exegetical attention. It examines various literary features and characteristics in the biblical text to make this point and to demonstrate that the women are the central literary characters. Androcentric interpreters usually ignore the women. They focus on the king, praising him for his wisdom in judging a difficult court case.2 Yet this essay maintains that the king turns out to be a fool because he does not listen to the common people, such as the two women who bring their complaint to the royal court. It turns out that the king is not a wise ruler at all. Rather, he controls his people with threats of violence and destruction. He is also vain, singing his own praises. However, a feminist hermeneutics informed by the comfort women teaches readers to listen to the women’s stories. The changed hermeneutical perspective yields a very different meaning of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28. It teaches readers to resist those in power and to question their authority, especially when they make decisions without listening to the people in general and marginalized women in particular. The following interpretation, examining various literary features of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 from the perspective of oppressed women, is grounded in the Korean comfort women’s perspectives that value women. The following literary-contextualized reading argues that the biblical narrative’s literary features, especially its textual, grammatical, and literary ambiguities, allow us to develop a subversive interpretation. The ambiguities indicate that the biblical tale is wide open to a subversive feminist reading in which the women are central and the king is not as wise as assumed. Ambiguity is a frequent literary device that confuses and frees readers. It inspires them to new insights.3 There are many ambiguities in the biblical story. The king is anonymous and, in fact, not named Solomon. The demonstrative pronouns are confusing. No crime and no punishment are mentioned. The appearance of the sword is strange. Most importantly, the mother of the 2  See, e.g., Mordechai Cogan, 1 Kings (Anchor Bible; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001), 196; Terrence Fretheim, First and Second Kings (Westminster Bible Companion; Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1999), 33–5. 3  The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines “ambiguity” as “a word or expression that can be understood in two or more possible ways.” Available at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ ambiguity [accessed on October 1, 2018].

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    99 living child is not identified and the king does not bother to identify her. All of these ambiguities make androcentric readings unconvincing that praise the king for his wise decision. What wise king? Does he not rule against the women when he does not even listen to their concerns? Several sections organize the analysis. The first section contextualizes the hermeneutical perspective of the so-called comfort women in South Korea to highlight the need to listen to oppressed women everywhere, including women’s voices in the selected biblical narrative. The second section outlines why it is crucial to emphasize the centrality of the two women in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28. The third section argues for the importance of the biblical women’s close relationship. The fourth section explains why the ambiguous uses of pronouns contributes to a confused understanding of the royal verdict. The fifth section scrutinizes the unclear aspects of the trial process depicted in the biblical tale. The sixth section questions the origins of the royal lack of wisdom. The conclusion connects the main findings with the situation of the Korean comfort women. Overall, then, this feminist study of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 reminds readers that both the biblical story and the devastating experiences of the former sex slaves of the Japanese military during the Second World War illustrate the ongoing need to listen to oppressed and marginalized women whose fate is decided in unjust ways by unjust, uncaring, and self-serving rulers even today.

Listening to Korean Comfort Women Comfort women started telling their stories only in 1991. One of stories comes from the former comfort woman, Ok-Seon Lee, a 90-year-old survivor.4 When she was 14 years old, a group of men abducted her on the streets in southeastern Busan City. They threw her into a car and took her to a so-called “comfort station” for the Japanese military in China. There she was raped daily for three years until the end of the war. She describes her experience in this way: “It was not a place for human beings. It was a slaughterhouse. We were often beaten, threatened and attacked with knives. We were 11, 12, 13 or 14 years old and we didn’t believe anyone would save us from that hell.” In a state of constant despair many girls committed suicide by drowning or hanging themselves. Lee also thought that suicide was her only option, but she decided to live on. After the Japanese surrender in August of 1945, the women were free again. They were confused and disoriented. Lee remembers: “I didn’t know where I should go. I had no money. I was homeless and had to sleep on the streets.” 4  Lee Ok-Seon’s testimony comes from Esther Felden’s articles, entitled “Former Comfort Woman Tells Uncomforting Story,” Deutsche Welle (February 9, 2013), available at http://www.dw.com/en/ former-comfort-woman-tells-uncomforting-story/a-17060384; and “ ‘Comfort Women’: The Wounds of their Lives,” Deutsche Welle (January 15, 2016), available at http://www.dw.com/en/comfort-women-thewounds-of-their-lives/a-18982702. Several Korean testimonies appear on the official website of the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan. Available at https://www. womenandwar.net/contents/custom/testimony/testimony.asp?page_str_menu=040401.

100   Yani Yoo She did not know how to get back to Korea. The shame she felt was so overwhelming that she kept the secret to herself for nearly sixty years. Lee married a man of Korean descent and took care of his children. “I felt it was my duty to take care of these children, whose mother had died. I wasn’t able to have any children of my own.” Because she had contracted a sexually transmitted disease in the “comfort station,” she became so sick that she nearly died. To increase her chances of survival, doctors removed her uterus. In 2000, after the death of her husband, she felt the urge to go back to her home country and to make her story public. Since then she has lived in the “House of Sharing,” which provides assisted living for former sex slaves. Lee’s story contains many typical elements of what other sex slaves had gone through. They were kidnapped or deceitfully taken away from their families. Afterwards they endured constant rape and other forms of torture and violence. Feeling ashamed, they suffered from sickness and poverty. They kept their secrets for decades. In fact, Japan’s war crimes and the women’s suffering were silenced until the early 1990s. The disclosure began with Haksoon Kim’s testimony in 1991, and eventually 238 women came forward and registered their complaint officially. Many of the women have died since 1991 and nowadays only twenty-six survivors with the average age of 92 are still alive. Major advocacy groups, including the Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan (est. 1990), the House of Sharing, and international support groups and individuals have made strenuous efforts to bring this issue to the public. Yet the survivors have never been properly heard.5 Lee was right when she observed many years ago: “My homeland was liberated, but we were not. We are still at war.” Only on December 28, 2015, the Japanese government offered the first official ­compensation through a secretive and sudden agreement with the South Korean government.6 They called it “the final and irreversible resolution.” Many commentators criticized this agreement because the survivors had not been consulted. The agreement also failed to concede the Japanese government’s responsibility for the crime. To the survivors, the agreement was like a slap in the face. They were disappointed with the Korean government for not taking a stance on their behalf and for accepting the low compensation of 1 billion yen or approximately 8.3 million U.S. dollars. They bemoaned that none of the few survivors were involved in the consultations. A statement from Hiroka Shoji of Amnesty International sums up the position of the victim-survivors and supporters: “The women were missing from the negotiation table and they must not be sold short in a deal that is more about political expediency than justice. Until the women get the full

5  In 1993, the Japanese government commissioned and published a study that officially recognized the existence of sexual slaves and the role of Japanese soldiers. After its publication, the Japanese government apologized on multiple occasions. However, the Japanese government never admitted its guilt, and it also did not properly offer any official financial compensation. 6  At the time, President Park Geun Hye of the conservative party led the government. In spring 2017, she became the first impeached president who was imprisoned for eighteen charges, including bribery, coercion, abuse of office, and illegal leaking of government secrets.

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    101 and unreserved apology from the Japanese government for the crimes committed against them, the fight for justice goes on.”7 In our age of global convergence, an important premise of any negotiation ought to focus on open and honest communication. It should include listening to the interested parties and cooperating with them. We do not often see this kind of communication between the rulers and the common people. We certainly do not see it in the case of the “comfort women.” As a feminist Korean Bible interpreter, I search for conversations between rulers and their people in the Bible. The story in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 is such a conversation, as it depicts two women seeking justice from their king. Do they receive royal listening and justice? Unfortunately, both the biblical women and the comfort women in South Korea do not receive much listening or justice from their rulers. Rulers ignore them and make decisions for their personal convenience only. It is about time that readers of the biblical tale change this grave injustice and learn to listen to the suffering of oppressed women both in the Bible and in today’s world. This essay fosters this hermeneutical stance.

Emphasizing the Centrality of the Two Women Read with a feminist hermeneutics that listens to Korean comfort women, the story of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 features two women as the central characters. Yet androcentric interpreters do not focus on the women when they identify the anonymous king as the famous, important, and wise King Solomon. Androcentric interpreters stress that this particular story appears in the midst of reports about Solomon. They maintain that the anonymous king must be Solomon. Yet in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 all of the characters are anonymous. None of them are named. Thus the assertion that the anonymous king must be King Solomon is questionable because it minimizes the significance of the women. This claim also leads to the almost reflexive assumption that the famous king deserves only praise for his decision, illustrating King Solomon’s wisdom.8 The subtitles of many commentaries reflect this belief as they classify the king’s decision when “A Wise Ruling” (NIV, OJB), “Solomon’s Wisdom in Judgment” (NRSV), or “Solomon’s Wise Judgment” (NKJV).9 Yet the more the king is praised, the less the women are heard or made visible. Androcentric readers also often note that the biblical tale includes characteristics found in many folktales around the world. It includes the common motif of two women claiming the same child and a judge who orders the splitting of the child in half or the pulling 7  “ ‘Comfort women’ deal must not deny survivors justice”; available at https://www.amnestyusa.org/ press-releases/comfort-women-deal-must-not-deny-survivors-justice/ [accessed September 20, 2018]. 8  See, e.g., Cogan, 1 Kings, 196; Fretheim, First and Second Kings, 33–5. 9  Three major Korean translated Bibles title the story as “Solomon’s Judgment” and do not include “wise” or “wisdom.”

102   Yani Yoo of the infant on both ends to give each woman half of the child. Commentators explain that the method represents a hidden emotional test to force each woman to give in to save the life of the child. The popular androcentric assumption of viewing the king as the central character of the story is problematic for several reasons. It limits the interpretation to a patriarchal pattern in which the women illustrate the king’s sophistication, power, and wisdom. The characterization of the biblical story as a riddle or a detective story commits the same fallacy.10 For instance, Meir Sternberg believes that this biblical tale merges the two genres of a riddle and a test.11 Hence, the young king must solve the juridical dilemma— a riddle—to pass the test and to be recognized as possessing divine wisdom. Other commentators also read the story as a riddle, as, for instance, Stuart Lasine who defines the story as a law-court riddle.12 Yet the classification of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 as a riddle or a detective story emphasizes the judge’s abilities and classifies the women as mere props in the king’s story. The androcentric habit of seeing incidents from the eyes of the “more important people” who are mostly men in esteemed and even royal positions ensures that readers do not recognize the significance of characters discarded as secondary, among them usually female characters. This is a serious mistake. In this narrative two women are the main speakers and actors. They appear in almost every verse of the story. In fact, they appear in nine out of thirteen verses. They also initiate the trial. Their arrival and their insistence on a court trial begin the procedures. They interact boldly and directly with the king.13 Many scholars take this direct interaction as an indication that the king cares about low-class people.14 However, the evidence of the king’s care for the two women is not obvious.15 10  Meir Sternberg, The Poetics of Biblical Narrative: Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading (Indiana Studies in Biblical Literature; Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1985), 166–8; Stuart Lasine, “The Riddle of Solomon’s Judgment and the Riddle of Human Nature in the Hebrew Bible,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 45 (1989); Gary A. Rendsburg, “The Guilty Party in 1 Kings III 16–28,” Vetus Testamentum 48 (1998): 534–41. 11 Sternberg, The Poetics of Biblical Narrative, 167. 12  Lasine, “The Riddle of Solomon’s Judgment and the Riddle of Human Nature in the Hebrew Bible,” 61. 13  Some cases in which the king interacts directly with people from the lower classes in a trial exist in the ancient Near East and the Hebrew Bible. In the sagas of Krt and ‘Aqht in the Ras Shamra texts, the kings sit in the place of public access and judge the case of a widow, an orphan, and the oppressed; see John Gray, I and II Kings: A Commentary (The Old Testament Library; second ed.; London: SCM Press, 1970). The story of David and the woman from Tekoa in 2 Samuel 14 is another biblical example. 14  For instance, Fretheim argues that the story focuses on Solomon’s ability to execute justice and to demonstrate his concern for personal and local matters; see his First and Second Kings, 34. 15  Some scholars evaluate the king’s interaction with prostitutes negatively. For instance, J. Daniel Hays suggests that this judgment story does not praise but criticizes Solomon, as both Deuteronomy and Leviticus outlaw prostitution; see his “Has the Narrator Come to Praise Solomon or to Bury Him? Narrative Subtlety in 1 Kings 1–11,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 28.2 (2003): 164. Another exegete, Marvin A. Sweeney, views Solomon as the chief magistrate. Sweeney considers Solomon as a model for the abuse of power perpetrated by David in stories such as 2 Samuel 11–12 and 2 Samuel 15; see his I & II Kings: A Commentary (Old Testament Library; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2007), 82.

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    103 Rather, the women demand his attention. They give long speeches (3:17–22) that silence the king for a long time. In contrast, the king appears in only four out of thirteen verses. As the king tries to catch up with the women’s stories, his first speech (3:23) merely repeats their speeches. The king becomes prominent only when he decides to use the sword. Even then the women are not silent. One of them makes the king leave her child alone and the other woman dares to scorn the king even at the critical moment of the sword. Importantly, the king gives the final verdict only after the women react. Although the king quiets the women and announces his verdict, the women are the central players throughout the entire narrative.

Recognizing the Women’s Close Relationship Another literary feature strengthens the reading of the biblical tale from the perspective of the women. The narrator depicts the women as having a close relationship with each other. Although they are introduced as prostitutes, it is unclear whether they are prostitutes by profession or whether they are called prostitutes because they are unmarried, pregnant, or live together. Sometimes, the term “prostitute” (zonah) refers to a woman who is sexually autonomous and has a different lifestyle from the cultural norms in Israelite society.16 In either case, the characterization of the women as prostitutes is one of the reasons for androcentric interpretations to ignore the women and to praise the king’s wisdom. Labeling the women as prostitutes does not allow readers to listen carefully to the women. It is as if they should be dismissed for their marginal status. Similarly, the situation of “comfort women” should not be associated with negative judgment or shame. All of these women are victim-survivors who have been silenced for far too long. Rather, the text depicts the women as having a close relationship with each other. Three textual clues indicate that the women are family and that the androcentric reading of the two women as rivals is a fallacy. First, the first woman implies that the second woman midwifed her childbirth. The literal translation of 3:17b, “I gave birth with her (‘immah) in the house,” sheds light on the situation.17 As there is no one else in the house, the second woman, despite being close to labor herself, helps the first woman during her childbirth. It is a huge task for a woman who is on the brink of childbirth to serve as a midwife and to take care of a mother who just gave birth. Second, the first woman suggests that she midwifed the second woman’s childbirth when she states in v. 18: “On the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. We were together.” 16  For instance, Oholah and Oholibah are figurative women, i.e. the nations of Israel and Judah, in Ezekiel 23. They are described as “playing the whore” when they go out with figurative men, i.e. other nations. 17  The NRSV translates 3:17b as “and I gave birth while she was in the house,” rendering the Hebrew word, ‘immah, as “while she was.”

104   Yani Yoo The second half of the verse reads: “There was no stranger with us in the house; only the two of us in the house” (v. 18b). Often the verse is interpreted as stating that there was no eyewitness. Yet in the context of childbirth, they helped and supported each other, risking their lives for each other. Third, the second woman cares about the first woman. We expect the second woman to refute the first woman’s accusation. For instance, she could have highlighted two logical contradictions in the first woman’s explanation. The first woman cannot reasonably reconstruct the incident because she claims she was asleep.18 Further, the first woman claims that she got up in the morning to nurse her son. The second woman could have used this statement of the first woman to demonstrate the first woman killed the child. She had laid on her own son during the night and did not realize it until it was too late in the morning. Instead, the second woman states: “No. Surely, my son is the living (one) and your son is the dead (one)” (v. 22). She neither attacks nor criticizes the first woman but she cares for her. The seemingly calm response invites us to imagine a different version of the incident in which the accuser finds her child dead in the morning. It takes into account the women’s close relationship. The accusing first woman panics, does not accept that she laid on her own child, and ends up with the conviction that the second woman laid on the child and swapped it during the night with her own infant. Accordingly, the second woman is saddened about her friend’s mistake and confusion. She mourns the loss of the child whose birth she midwifed. She is despondent about her friend’s claim of child swapping, but she maintains her calm. Her non-critical response prompts the first woman’s short response. It is a chiastic repetition of the second woman’s sentence and different from her previous long and emotional speech. She states: “No. Surely, your son is the dead (one) and my son is the living (one)” (v. 22). The textual clues indicate that the women have a lot in common. Both of them are characterized as prostitutes and both of them live in the same house (3:16, 17). Both of them give birth to a son almost at the same time. Both women assist each other in childbirth (3:17, 18). Both of them put their child near to them while they sleep (3:20). Both women “get up” (qum; 3:20, 21). Both speak (3:22). The frequent use of the Hebrew word “house” (bayit) also shows their close physical relationship. In Hebrew, the word even means “family” (e.g. Gen. 7:1; Josh. 24:15; 1 Sam. 27:3),19 and it appears four times in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28. The word thus suggests that the women are family to each other. Yet their close relationship is endangered when one of the infants dies. At this moment their troubles begin. The first woman coldly calls her close friend and family member “this woman” (v. 16). The king’s response does not help in this moment of crisis. 18  Many scholars note the discrepancy of the plaintiffs. However, the Septuagint omits the phrase “and your maidservant was asleep” because, according to the translators, the plaintiff is the true mother of the living child. The translators sought to eliminate the contradiction; see, e.g., Lasine, “The Riddle of Solomon’s Judgment and the Riddle of Human Nature in the Hebrew Bible,” 67. 19  Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (vol. 1; Leiden: Brill, 2001), 125. Moshe Garsiel states that the repetition of the word “house” (four times) shows the closeness of the women. “Revealing and Concealing as a Narrative Strategy in Solomon’s Judgment (1 Kings 3:16–28).” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 64.2 (2002): 239.

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    105 This is also the moment in which readers need to listen to them, as the women cry out for resolution, justice, healing, and the next step in their lives. Importantly and in contrast, not every comfort woman registers her complaint. Among the comfort women who called out, some of them preferred to settle with meager compensation whereas other comfort women still demand sincere apologies and full compensation from the Japanese government. Since their various and dwindling voices are disappearing, we need to listen to them more earnestly than ever.

Discovering the Ambiguity of Pronouns Yet another literary feature offers support for a focus on the biblical women in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28. It relates to the ambiguous use of pronouns. When ambiguous pronouns refer to the women, the story seems to hint at the fact that the women and their concern do not matter much to the king. The king’s use of pronouns is ambiguous in all of his speeches, as if to confuse everybody about which woman he is addressing. For instance, when the king speaks in verse 23, he uses the same demonstrative pronoun, “this,” to refer to either woman: “This says, ‘This is my son the living and your son is the dead. And this says, ‘No. Surely your son is the dead and my son is the living.’ ”20 The king also reverses the order of the women’s speeches so that the king’s use of the same demonstrative pronoun for either woman makes the women undistinguishable in the text. In addition, the king’s speech is a monologue as if to suggest that, to him, the women are indistinguishable and he is not interested in their respective stories. After his monologue, the king orders a sword and to cut the child into two halves. In his command the king uses the pronoun “one” (‘eḥad) for both women, stating: “Cut the living child into two. Give the half to one and the half to one.”21 The order implies that each woman gets half of the child, but again the women’s identities are unclear. To the king, they are a nuisance, and he wants to get rid of them as soon as possible. Yet the ambiguous use of pronouns reaches its climax only at the order of the king to distribute one half of the child to each woman. After the king commands the child to be cut in two, the birthmother appeals: “Please my lord, give her the living child and never let him die!” (3:26a). Then, “this” (woman) says, ‘Also to me, also to you he will not belong. Cut!’ ” (3:26b). Thereupon the king orders: “Give to her the living child. Never let him die. She is his mother.” Again, ambiguous pronouns abound. Who is “her” and “she” in the king’s judgment? Is she the accuser who first appears by giving a long speech or is 20  English translations of this passage often distinguish the women by adding vocabulary, such as “the first woman” and “the other woman” or “this one” and “that one.” 21  NRSV, NKJV, and NASB distinguished the women in 3:25 as “one” and “the other.” For the usage of ‘eḥad as “one” and “the other,” see Koehler and Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, 30.

106   Yani Yoo she the second woman who gives a short speech? Who is the birthmother and who gives the last speech? The narrator does not disclose who is who, leaving the conclusion wide open. The reader has to play three-card Monte.22 Pronoun ambiguities ensure that the identity of the biological mother is unclear. Some interpreters find the plaintiff convincing, reasonable, and polite, and determine that she is the “true” mother.23 Others believe the defendant is the real mother.24 Due to the ambiguity, I suggest that the king addresses the woman who speaks right before his speech. If so, the king fails to identify the biological mother of the living child and ends up giving the child to the wrong mother. What should readers think of a royal judge who uses pronouns confusingly in his court where precise wording is essential to judge with fairness and in justice? The ambiguous use of pronouns suggests that the authority of the king needs to be deconstructed. He is careless in his use of pronouns as he is insensitive to the women. No wonder the woman’s final word commands the king: “Cut!” (3:26b). Readers should not take literarily the harsh sounding response of “this” woman. Her speech should be understood rhetorically. Perhaps her response is better understood as saying: “Wanna cut the child? Go ahead! Suit yourself!” She expresses her anger about, disappointment with, and opposition to the king who handles their case hastily and with vague pronouns.25 She sounds like comfort women who even in the midst of their diseases and dying adamantly refuse double-tongued apologies and cheap negotiations.

Investigating the Topsy-Turvy Trial Yet another literary clue for the women’s effort to be listened to is the topsy-turvy trial that lacks proper process before the verdict is announced. An autopsy of the dead child did not exist. Hence, neither the cause nor the time of the infant’s death are known. The crime scene is not investigated as police work did not exist. There is no evidence, 22  Richard D. Nelson proposes that the first woman is the real mother because she is compassionate, but his next comment expresses his doubt: “But wait! Is the reader being fooled in the process? We cannot be sure if our favorite first speaker really is the woman of compassion”; see Richard D. Nelson, First and Second Kings (Interpretation; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1987), 38. 23 Simon J. DeVries, 1 Kings (Word Biblical Commentary 12; Dallas, TX: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2003), 58; Garsiel, “Revealing and Concealing as a Narrative Strategy in Solomon’s Judgment (1 Kings 3:16–28),” 244–6. Burke O. Long, 1 Kings: With an Introduction to Historical Literature (FOTL 9; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1984), 67–70; Herbert C. Brichto, Toward a Grammar of Biblical Poetics: Tales of the Prophets (New York, NY / Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 47–63. 24  Rendsburg, “The Guilty Party in 1 Kings III 16–28.” Ilya and Gila Leibowitz, “Solomon’s Judgment” (in Hebrew), Beth Mikra 35 (1990): 242–4; Efraim Y. Wizenberg, “Solomon’s Judgment” (in Hebrew), Mv Hamidrashia 9–10 (1973): 41–2. Quoted from Garsiel, “Revealing and Concealing,” 233. 25  Contra Hugh Pyper who thinks this woman is cannibalistic; see his “Judging the Wisdom of Solomon: The Two-Way Effect of Intertextuality,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 59 (1993): 25–36. Also contra DeVries who argues that “the other harlot typifies the meanness of which the human spirit is capable. She can do nothing but hate, hate, hate”; see DeVries, 1 Kings, 58.

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    107 no witness, and no cross-examination. The king plays the trinity of the judge, the defense lawyer, and the prosecutor. The king never asks the women any questions. The women mostly speak to each other rather than to the judge. If the plaintiff told the truth, the defendant should be punished for involuntary manslaughter, kidnapping the living child, and swapping the infant with the dead one. There is also no proof that the first woman tells the truth. If she told a lie, she would make the defendant suffer the unfairness of a false accusation. She would also mock the court. In that case, a second trial for the false accusation should follow. In the end, no crime is named and no sentence is pronounced. The king fails to judge the authenticity of the initial accusation. His trial is based on the women’s words and reactions. The story begins with the charge that a criminal swapped the dead child with the living one. The story ends with the king’s judgment that gives the living child to one of the mothers, but it is unclear whether she is the first or the second woman. It seems likely that the king gives the child to the woman who is not the biological mother. Another literary feature, contributing to the topsy-turvy trial process, relates to the appearance of the sword as a decisive factor in the trial. The sword has two blades. Most readers believe that the king uses the sword only as a prop. They assume that he only threatens to kill the infant with the sword but never intends to use it.26 Scholars defend this reading even when they criticize the king’s use of the sword as a prop.27 Some interpreters advise not guessing whether the king would have gone ahead with the execution if the true mother had not made her offer.28 James Kugel asks who is stupid enough to believe that the king would divide the child in two.29 These comments indicate that Western scholars have not experienced dictatorship and human atrocities in their own lives. Another possibility should be seriously considered. The king is ready to use the sword to divide the child and the birth mother takes his threat seriously. If she was confident that the king merely threatened to kill the child, she would not be willing to give up her son. In fact, other narratives in 1 Kings describe Solomon using his sword in murderous ways. He consolidates his reign by killing his brother Adonijah, General Joab, and Shimei who oppose David. In light of the violent actions of the king in these stories, readers should believe the king is ready to kill, this time an infant, especially since the topsy-turvy trial lacks any investigation of the incident and critical elements in the trial demonstrate that the women do not receive a fair trial. The women’s courtroom situation is not very different from what the comfort women have experienced. They, too, have not received a trial for the war crimes they had to endure many decades ago.

26  For Cogan, the king cleverly creates a threat. See his I King, 154; for Garsiel, the king uses a “nonconventional solution.” See “Revealing and Concealing,” 247. 27  Gina Hens-Piazza puts it this way: Solomon’s judicial strategy is a “dangerous move . . . a cruel trick that blackmails motherhood”; see her 1–2 Kings (Abingdon Old Testament Commentaries; Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2006), 46. 28  See, e.g., DeVries, 1 Kings, 61. 29  James Kugel, How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture, Then and Now (New York, NY: Free Press, 2007), 505.

108   Yani Yoo

Uncovering the Failure of the “Listening Heart” Another literary element communicates the significance of reading with the women in the story. It raises the question whether the story illustrates the king’s wisdom or folly. Importantly, the story of Solomon who receives wisdom from God at Gibeon (1 Kings 3) appears directly after the story in which David attributes a particular meaning to wisdom (1 Kings 2). In light of this literary placement of 1 Kings 3, exegetes often observe that Solomon’s wisdom is similar to David’s.30 David mentions wisdom as he makes his last words to Solomon. He instructs his son what to do with Joab, the sons of Barzillai, and Shimei. Earlier, Barzillai helps David at a crucial moment in his life, and so David asks Solomon to respect the sons of Barzillai. David does not explicitly mention “wisdom” when he instructs Solomon about the Barzillais, but he uses “wisdom” when he asks Solomon to kill Joab and Shimei. In fact, David says about Joab: “Act therefore according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to Sheol in peace” (1 Kgs. 2:6). David talks about Shimei in a similar way: “You are a wise man; you will know what you ought to do to him, and you must bring his gray head down with blood to Sheol” (1 Kgs. 2:9). Consequently, Solomon gets rid of Joab and Shimei at the end of 1 Kings 2. The wisdom that David teaches Solomon is thus not the wisdom in the sense of being wise. Rather, it ought to be understood as a shrewd way of life and as the skill of getting rid of problems quickly, by means of violence or by any means necessary. Another literary detail addresses the difficulty for readers to be certain that the king is indeed a wise king. In 1 Kgs. 3:9 Solomon asks God for wisdom. In Hebrew this kind of wisdom is expressed with the phrase of “a listening heart.” It appears right before the story of the two women. On the surface, the king handles the women’s case with the wisdom he just received from God.31 But on a deeper level, his “wise” decision to employ the sword in 1 Kings 3 turns out to be the same dangerous “wisdom” of 1 Kings 2.32 The question is whether he really listens to the women during the trial. Hugh Pyper’s sums up the point: “Solomon stops to listen to the pleas of the woman and is prepared to reach his conclusion.”33 The king does not ask what each woman hopes to get from the trial. He also does not give them enough time to tell their stories. Instead, he deals with them roughly and quickly.34 Above all, he does not treat them with full respect. To him, 30  Pyper, “Judging the Wisdom of Solomon,” 31; Joel Rosenberg, King and Kin: Political Allegory in the Hebrew Bible (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1986), 186; Walter Brueggemann, 1 and 2 Kings (Smyth & Helwys Commentary; Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2000), 54. 31  DeVries believes that the main theme of the story is the wise king. The king is like God and has a godlike wisdom; see DeVries, 1 Kings, 60, 62. 32  Brueggemann puts it this way: “Solomon’s ‘wisdom’ from God is not ‘nice’. . . . In the end this wisdom turns out to be self-destructive foolishness in masquerade”; see Brueggemann, 1 & 2 Kings, 55. 33  Pyper, “Judging the Wisdom of Solomon,” 33. 34  Ellen Van Wolde explains that the king’s attitude, his willingness to use his sword, his harsh words, and his instant action do not make it easy for readers to empathize with him; see her “Who

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    109 they are lower-class women who live together without husbands, none of which is advantageous to getting through to the king’s ears. In other words, he is not a particularly wise ruler. Similarly, the majority of the powerful and the wise of both Korean and Japanese governments do not listen to the comfort women. They have failed to take women seriously and to give them the respect they deserve. Another moment depicts the questionable nature of the king’s wisdom. Toward the end of the tale, the word “wisdom” appears in the response of the people. Verse 28 reads: “All Israel heard the judgment the king judged and they were afraid before the king, because they saw that God’s wisdom to do judgment was in him.” In other words, the people who are absent during the trial learn that the king threatens to use the sword and to quickly decide the case before him. The people must have dreaded the king because he exercises his power so recklessly. Admittedly, this reading seems to contradict the next rationale of verse 28 which states: “because they saw that God’s wisdom to do judgment was in him.” Yet this line is perhaps a covert subversion with which the narrator hides the subversive meaning of the story.35 Eric Seibert, identifying various texts written by “subversive scribes,”36 explains that sometimes writers pose as subversive scribes when they write about royal activities. After all, a king hired them, and so the scribes resorted to subversion to express dissatisfaction with actions and words of their rulers. More specifically, subversive scribes intended to erode the legitimacy of the rulers by criticizing official policies and practices. Concealed subversion functions to offer consensus, cohesion, or entertainment for like-minded insiders, and so some readers detect the hidden critique while others remain unaware of it. Although Seibert does not list 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 as a scribal subversion story, his idea fits this tale. On the surface, the text praises the king. However, it also contains numerous literary landmines that ridicule and criticize the king. Accordingly, verse 28 protects the narrator from the rage of the ruler. One verse seems to praise the king by using an excessive compliment, “God’s wisdom,” but the story as a whole describes the king as a tyrant who does not care for the people in his courthouse. It is as if the people talk behind his back in a scornful way: “Oh yea, he has God-given wisdom! Believe it or not.” After all, as Pyper observes, the king wants to finish the case quickly and his concern is not to rule with justice.37 Since the story does not include reactions from the women to the ruling, it is impossible to know whether they appreciate the royal verdict. It seems likely that the women are upset because they feel unheard, ignored, and uncomforted. In short, the story is a parody about the political ideology of rulers. It makes fun of the Gibeon story that presents Solomon’s wisdom as coming from God (1 Kgs. 3:1–15). Read accordingly, the narrative depicts people’s response to the new king. They want the emperor to execute justice, but he disappoints them. The king’s “listening heart” fails Guides Whom? Embeddedness and Perspective in Biblical Hebrew and in 1 Kings 3:16–28,” Journal of Biblical Literature 114.4 (1995): 637. 35  See Eric A. Seibert, Subversive Scribes and the Solomonic Narrative: A Rereading of 1 Kings 1–11 (Library of Hebrew Bible Studies 436; London: T&T Clark, 2006). 36  Ibid., 19, 63–66, and passim. 37  Pyper, “Judging the Wisdom of Solomon,” 33.

110   Yani Yoo them, and so the noun “wisdom” appears only once at the very end of the story (v. 28). In contrast, words with the root meaning of “life” and “death” occur eight and eleven times respectively. In other words, this biblical story is more about life and death than about wisdom. As the king tries to wrap the people around his little finger, the people need to be careful about him so that they survive in his empire. The story warns people about their foolish, unilateral, and dangerous leaders. The fact that the terrible atrocities done against teen girls are not resolved when the women are in their 90s shows how unwise, unable, and unreliable political leaders are even today.38

Women under Blades and Blazes: A Conclusion The Korean context of the “comfort women” helps to rethink the interpretation of 1 Kgs. 3:16–28. For far too long, interpreters of this biblical narrative side with the king. It is time that the women receive their due attention. Just as the two biblical women are central in their trial story, the Korean “comfort women” ought to be regarded as the agents of their legal cases against the Japanese government. Most importantly, the stories of all of these women must be told from their perspectives. When readers sideline oppressed women as the main characters, often they marginalize them in favor of concerns about national security or foreign relations. Instead, we have to listen to marginalized women when they stand before the rulers of their societies. When we read 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 accordingly, various literary features and characteristics become significant. They pertain to the roles and close relationship of the women, the ambiguous uses of pronouns, the topsy-turvy trial proceedings, the quick judgment of the king, his willingness to rely upon a violent political strategy, and the people’s fearful response. All of these elements discredit the hegemonic reading that the king judged the women’s case with divine wisdom. The propaganda of the king’s wisdom turns out to be satire against his violence. It caricatures a foolish king who almost kills an innocent child and who does not listen to the women. The king’s inability to identify the birth mother of the living child, to find an offender, and to sentence without violence ridicules his authority and power. His inability to speak clearly and his willingness to kill the child add to his incompetence. Read with a feminist hermeneutics, the story invites readers to subvert and scoff at the foolish and incompetent king who ignores public sentiments. The story turns into a warning to the common people to beware those in power. 38  The new president of Korea, Moon Jae-in, criticized the controversial 2015 deal on wartime “comfort women” and set a national day in their memory. In his speech at the first official ceremony on August 14, 2018, he said that this issue cannot “be solved through diplomatic solutions between the two countries. . . . It is an issue that can be solved only when the world, including ourselves and Japan, deeply reflects on sexual violence against all women and human rights problems and comes to a strong awareness and learns a lesson in a way that prevents this from ever repeating again” [retrieved September 27, 2018, from https://english1.president.go.kr/BriefingSpeeches/Speeches/60].

The Demand to Listen to Korean “Comfort Women”    111 Women and innocent victims in many corners of the world endure many forms of oppression and violence. Who will use a true “listening heart” and give their ears to women and the oppressed? Who will lift the sword from them and pull them out of the fire? Since 1992, the victim-survivors of Japanese military sexual slavery demonstrate every Wednesday in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul City, Korea. After twenty-six years of demonstrations and consistent domestic and international efforts, they have yet to be heard fully and with empathy. Just as the story of the two women in 1 Kgs. 3:16–28 awaits the listening ears of readers, the “comfort women” also ask for a full hearing, full apologies, and full compensation. Yet the biblical story teaches that powerful people, usually men, do not listen to women, especially women with little power and low status in the public sphere.

Bibliography Brueggemann, Walter. 1 and 2 Kings. Smyth & Helwys Commentary. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2000. DeVries, Simon J. 1 Kings. Word Biblical Commentary. Vol. 12. Dallas, TX: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2003. Hays, J. Daniel. “Has the Narrator Come to Praise Solomon or to Bury Him? Narrative Subtlety in 1 Kings 1–11.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 28.2 (2003): 149–74. Hens-Piazza, Gina. 1–2 Kings. Abingdon Old Testament Commentaries. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2006. Lasine, Stuart. “The Riddle of Solomon’s Judgment and the Riddle of Human Nature in the Hebrew Bible.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 45 (1989): 61–86. Pyper, Hugh. “Judging the Wisdom of Solomon: The Two-Way Effect of Intertextuality.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 59 (1993): 25–36. Rendsburg, Gary A. “The Guilty Party in 1 Kings III 16–28.” Vetus Testamentum 48 (1998): 534–41. Seibert, Eric A. Subversive Scribes and the Solomonic Narrative: A Rereading of 1 Kings 1–11. Library of Hebrew Bible Studies 436. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Sweeney, Marvin  A. I & II Kings: A Commentary. Old Testament Library. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2007. Van Wolde, Ellen. “Who Guides Whom? Embeddedness and Perspective in Biblical Hebrew and in 1 Kings 3:16–28.” Journal of Biblical Literature 114.4 (1995): 623–42.

chapter 8

R ea di ng th e Bibl e from Bel ow i n th e Er a of Gl oba liz ation Rainer Kessler

The era of globalization challenges biblical scholars of all backgrounds to wrestle with the economic issues as they appear in the Bible. As a German Old Testament professor, I take seriously the fact that since the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 the economic forces of globalization do not face any obstacles of restraint anymore. I noticed the might of unhinged economic exploitation when I visited Chile for the first time in 1989. My visit was prior to the events in my native country and sixteen years after General Pinochet’s September 11, 1973, coup d’état against the legitimate government of President Salvador Allende. Pinochet had produced the first experiment of neoliberalism and economic globalization in the world, leading to the closure of huge industrial plants that once produced not only train wagons for the country and its Latin American neighbors but also offered thousands of jobs. Chilean fishermen found themselves unable to compete with industrialized fishing fleets that hailed from nations around the world, and whose trawling nets caught every fish in their ways. Thus, entire Chilean families lost their income which then led to further hardship: sometimes Chilean daughters had to prostitute themselves to foreign sailors to make a living for themselves and their families. In light of these and many other political and economic developments that the term “globalization” captures, this essay suggests that Bible scholars need to read biblical texts in solidarity with ordinary readers who face incredible situations of economic and political injustice and exploitation. That the Bible ought to be read from below is not a new insight. The first movement of “popular readings” of the Bible started in the late 1970s in Latin America. Communities of so-called ordinary readers who had no theological or exegetical training read the Bible together, and professional scholars introduced the results of these readings into their scholarship. In Brazil, Carlos Mesters founded CEBI (= Centro de Estudos Bíblicos), the center for biblical studies that organized meetings and collected the

114   Rainer Kessler results.1 A group of Latin American biblical scholars decided to found a new journal to promote a dialog between “popular readings” and scholarly exegesis. In 1988, the first volume of RIBLA (= Revista de Interpretación Bíblica Latino-Americana) appeared. It was dedicated to the popular reading of the Bible in Latin America. Pablo Richard from Argentina developed what he named “liberation hermeneutics” of the popular reading.2 Post-colonial readings were later added to the traditional popular readings of Latin American base communities. The perspective of the non-Western diaspora in the West deepened the perspective of the non-Western world. Fernando Segovia subsumed both perspectives under the notion of “the margins.”3 Although popular readings in the tradition of liberation theology and post-colonial studies are not identical, they are “companions in struggle.”4 On the African continent, Musa W. Dube from Botswana and Gerald West from South Africa are pioneers in reading the Bible with “ordinary readers.” The results of these readings appear in several volumes.5 Dube and West explain the meaning of ordinary readers when they state: “The term ‘ordinary’ is used in a general and a specific sense. The general includes all readers who read the Bible pre-critically. We also use the term ‘ordinary’ to designate a particular sector of pre-critical readers, those readers who are poor and marginalized.”6 Dube stresses that “reading from below” is a question not only of class but also of gender. Accordingly, she organized special readings with African women.7 Yet in spite of this rich tradition of reading the Bible from below, the academic field of biblical studies has unfortunately not been open to reading against economic and political structures of globalization that exploit and dominate ordinary people, whether they live in Latin America, Africa, the United States, Europe, or other parts of the world. Some scholars bring popular and academic readings closer to each other. One of those scholars is Hans de Wit from The Netherlands who initiated two worldwide reading processes. They resulted in two volumes that combine ordinary readings with academic 1  On CEBI, its history and organization, method and hermeneutics, see Susann Schüepp, Bibellektüre und Befreiungsprozesse: Eine empirisch-theologische Untersuchung mit Frauen in Brasilien (exuz 16; Berlin: LIT Verlag 2006), 25–42. 2  Pablo Richard, “Lectura popular de la Biblia en América Latina: Hermenéutica de la liberación,” RIBLA 1 (1988): 30–48. 3 Fernando F. Segovia, Decolonizing Biblical Studies: A View from the Margins (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000). 4 R. S. Sugirtharajah, Postcolonial Criticism and Biblical Interpretation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002; repr. 2009), 117. 5  See Gerald O. West and Musa W. Dube, eds., The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories, and Trends (Boston, MA / Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2001). For a methodological reflection, see Gerald O. West, The Academy of the Poor: Towards a Dialogical Reading of the Bible (Pietermaritzburg: Cluster Publications, 2003). Also see Gerald West and Musa W. Dube, eds., “Reading With”: An Exploration of the Interface between Critical and Ordinary Readings of the Bible: African Overtures,” Semeia 73 (1996): 7. 6  West and Dube, eds., “ ‘Reading With,’ ” 7. 7  Musa W. Dube, ed., Other Ways of Reading: African Women and the Bible (Atlanta, GA: SBL/ Geneva: WCC Publications, 2001).

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   115 discussion.8 Another volume, co-edited by de Wit and Gerald O. West, brings together African and European readings.9 Still, what needs to be acknowledged is that mainstream academia is not prepared to welcome these efforts to create dialog between ordinary and scholarly readers. Yet this essay aims to seek such a dialog by giving full attention to ordinary readings of the Bible in an academic setting. Two main sections structure the discussion. The first section, focusing on economic neoliberalism in biblical scholarship, outlines the obstacles that readings from below encounter in academia. The second section discusses the benefits of readings from below.

The Debate over Economic Neoliberalism in Biblical Scholarship The economic discourse on neoliberal globalization has led many biblical scholars to investigate the Bible’s economic perspectives, especially in the prophetic literature. Yet often Bible scholars fiercely oppose readings that focus on social justice and economic equality. They assume the reality of neoliberal globalization and thus defend capitalist principles in the socio-political establishment of ancient Israel. One of the boldest approaches comes from Morris Silver who portrays ancient Israel as a proto-capitalist economy.10 An economist, specializing in ancient economies, Silver advises historians of ancient Israelite economy “to spend more time looking at modern economic theory and the evidence for market-oriented behaviour.”11 He believes that “[t]he Israelite economy of the eighth-seventh centuries was by no means primitive. It was a living economy whose entrepreneurs . . . responded positively and rationally to market opportunities.”12 Silver portrays ancient Judah as a prosperous country in which debt slavery was a beneficial institution “whereby the poor but ambitious individual could gain access to capital by self-sale.”13 Silver knows that the economic situation of ancient Israel is usually described in much more negative terms than he describes it. Silver, however, attributes the negative portrayals of ancient Israel’s economic situation to skewed depictions in the prophetic literature and liberal-minded Bible historians. For instance, he declares: “Modern liberal-minded attitudes, more or less closely linked to the prophecies of Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Micah, Jeremiah, Zephaniah, and Ezekiel are . . . the main 8  Hans de Wit, Louis C. Jonker, Marleen Kool, and Daniel Schipani, eds., Through the Eyes of Another: Intercultural Reading of the Bible (Elkart, IN / Amsterdam: Institute of Mennonite Studies/Vrije Universiteit, 2004); Hans de Wit and Janet Dyk, eds., Bible and Transformation: The Promise of Intercultural Bible Reading (Semeia Studies 81; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015). 9  Hans de Wit and Gerald O. West, eds., African and European Readers of the Bible in Dialogue: In Quest of a Shared Meaning (Studies of Religion in Africa 32; Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill, 2008). 10  Morris Silver, Prophets and Markets: The Political Economy of Ancient Israel (Boston, MA: Kluwer-Nijhoff Publishing 1983). 11  Ibid., xi. 12  Ibid., 24. 13  Ibid., 71.

116   Rainer Kessler source of negativism regarding the eighth and seventh centuries.”14 In Silver’s view, ­biblical prophets and lawgivers of the Torah tried “to nullify the laws of economy and society.”15 He speculates that “these well-meaning but uncomprehending efforts backfired disastrously”16 when prophets and legislators initiated a “process of total social destruction in the name of total social justice.”17 He states that Israel and Judah were not destroyed “because the prophetic counsel was ignored”: “as an economist and social scientist, I can testify that whatever its presumed moral virtues, the advice of the classical prophets was destructive from the standpoint of economic affluence and political strength.”18 In other words, Silver favors the geopolitics of economic exploitation and imperial politics and thus advances the principle of economic effectiveness as a hermeneutical reading strategy. He assumes that the economic ideology of the prophets led to the destruction of ancient Israel as a geo-political entity. This ideology prevented ancient Israel from prospering as a country, and so Israel eventually succumbed to the economically and politically stronger nations that adhered to economic power and political strength. Their ideological stance stood in contrast to biblical notions of social justice. Although Silver’s position is an extreme example of a pro-neoliberal hermeneutical stance, his is not the only case favoring the neoliberal economic model. Some thirty years later, in 2012, Philippe Guillaume begins from the opposite starting point. Yet his conclusion is similar to Silver’s conclusion.19 Guillaume explains that ancient Israel was a typical agrarian society of antiquity. Already in 2003, Eckart Otto points to the temporal distance between the biblical and the modern era when he stresses “the historical distance of an ancient text to the present marked by the secular rationalism of world domination (die historische Abständigkeit eines antiken Textes zur Gegenwart einer modernen Gesellschaft des säkularen Rationalismus der Weltbeherrschung).”20 Like Otto, Guillaume accuses contemporary exegetes of “class-struggle romanticism” that repeats “a number of slogans” and “untested assumptions,”21 and regards Israelite prophets as “the heroes of the tale.”22 Guillaume, too, does not deny the existence of debt-slavery, exploitation, or indebtedness in ancient Israel but he considers these practices as more or less beneficial. He explains: “The aim is not to deny the existence of exploitation. Exploitation is always resented as extortion and injustice by the exploited, but exploitation and taxation are signs of economic health that benefit everyone, albeit in

14  Ibid., 112–13. 15  Ibid., 135. 16  Ibid., 135. 17  Ibid., 206. 18  Ibid., 249. 19  Philippe Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crisis: Agrarian Finance in the Hebrew Bible (Sheffield/ Oakville: Equinox, 2012). 20  Eckart Otto, “Sozialethische Programme zur Überwindung nationaler Schuldenkrisen in der Antike und ihre programmatische Bedeutung für die Überwindung der heutigen Internationalen Schulden­krise,” in Die Diskussion um ein Insolvenzrecht für Staaten: Bewertungen eines Lösungsvorschlages zur Überwindung der Internationalen Schuldenkrise, ed. Martin Dabrowski, Andreas Fisch, Karl Gabriel, and Christoph Lienkamp (Volkswirtschaftliche Schriften 530; Berlin: Duncker & Humblot 2003), 97. 21 Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crisis, 1. 22  Ibid., 15.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   117 ­different proportions.”23 Thus, in his view, indebtedness “has in fact always been the norm . . . and . . . constitutes the mark of a healthy economy rather than the sign of a structural crisis.”24 The economic belief that indebtedness is beneficial to the economy of ancient Israel has hermeneutical consequences. For instance, Guillaume explains that the actions of the creditor in 2 Kgs. 4:1–7 ought to be seen as “a charitable act out of which neither party made a fortune.”25 In fact, Guillaume explains that readers will “run the risk of appearing as naïve armchair idealists with little grip on reality” if they oppose the reading that “seeks to introduce a measure of realism in the exegesis of biblical texts relative to economic life in ancient Israel.”26 Guillaume thus buys into the neoliberal notion of economic exploitation and taxation as positive signs of a functioning economic system, applies those ideas to biblical interpretation, and then chastises other readers for losing their grip on the socio-economic reality in ancient Israel if they disagree with his reading. Certainly, Silver and Guillaume are not the only scholars who analyze ancient Israelite society from a neoliberal, economic stance. Another exegete is the German biblical exegete, Ernst-Axel Knauf, for whom the conflict “between winners and losers of modernization (zwischen Modernisierungs-Gewinnern und Modernisierungs-Verlierern)” represents the heart of ancient Israel’s socio-political problems.27 Knauf admits that the inhabitants of Israelite cities became much richer than people in the countryside during the eighth century bce. Yet he also insists that not this fact “but its moral valuation (nicht der Sachverhalt ist strittig . . . , sondern dessen moralische Bewertung)” is disputed. To Knauf, the prophetic literature and the rigid laws of the Torah ought to be understood as an expression of the protest of hillbillies who no longer understand their increasingly complex society and not as a general description of the socio-political situation in ancient Israel. In other words, Knauf ’s historical reconstruction marginalizes biblical texts about social justice as protest literature that did not represent the majority position in ancient Israel. This kind of historical reconstruction finds acclaim in historical critical scholarship and has led to repeated dismissals of the prophetic literature for not offering realistic portrayals of Israelite society. For instance, according to the British exegete Lester Grabbe prophetic oracles are unreliable. He states: “The prophets seem to inveigh against everyone. Whatever else you may say about the pre-exilic prophets, they were generally . . . curmudgeons. There is no favouritism: they hate everybody.”28 The prophetic books are thus sidelined as political literature, and they are to be ignored in economic depictions of ancient Israelite society.

23  Ibid., 112. 24  Ibid., 122. 25  Ibid., 167. 26  Ibid., 112. 27  Ernst-Axel Knauf, “Mythos Kanaan. Oder: Sex, Lügen und Propheten-Schriften,” Welt und Umwelt der Bibel 21 (2001): 42. 28  Lester Grabbe, “Sup-urbs or only Hyp-urbs? Prophets and Populations in Ancient Israel and Socio-historical Method,” in “Every City Shall Be Forsaken”: Urbanism and Prophecy in Ancient Israel and the Near East, ed. Lester Grabbe and Robert D. Haak (JSOT Sup 330; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press 2001), 121.

118   Rainer Kessler In sum, many nonbiblical and biblical scholars endorse economic principles favored in our era of neoliberal globalization. Thus, exegetes often project contemporary economic ideas back into their readings and, in the process, they also reject interpretations that identify social-justice principles as central in the Bible. Even worse, such interpreters attribute social-justice principles to “modern liberal-minded attitudes”29 or to “theological wolves in the guise of sociological lambs.”30 Grabbe’s critique is perhaps extreme in its wording, but it can be found in many neoliberal exegetical treatises. For instance, Grabbe criticizes the social-justice analysis of the Bible as “rising out of preoccupations of the 60s liberal challenge to the establishment.”31 Similarly, Otto believes that socialjustice oriented exegetes are social romantics who rediscover “class-struggle romanticism of early capitalism in the social critique of the prophets (Klassenkampfromantik des Frühkapitalismus in der prophetischen Sozialkritik).”32 Furthermore, Guillaume speaks of “the class-struggle romanticism of the exegetical defenders of the poor”33 who, in his view, select “a naive paraphrase of pet biblical texts passed as a historical perspective.”34 To these defenders of the neoliberal ideology, their opponents pose “as modern prophets,”35 certainly an absurd characterization of those who read the Bible in solidarity with ordinary readers, most of whom are poor. In my view, neoliberal adherents target the Bible and not biblical exegetes. For instance, Silver admits that the “modern liberal-minded attitudes,” which he criticizes, are “more or less closely linked to the prophecies of Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Micah, Jeremiah, Zephaniah, and Ezekiel.”36 He claims that the social legislation of the Bible is inspired by those prophets in their “well-meaning but uncomprehending efforts.”37 In the view of Silver and his colleagues, the Bible is historically outdated, and its ethics are an obstacle for developing an effective and functioning contemporary neoliberal-capitalist economy. Yet these scholars are not wrong in one aspect. The Bible is indeed a document from the pre-modern era, and its social ethics opposes economic effectiveness because the Bible favors social justice over economic affluence. As Knauf admits, the evaluation of this fact depends on one’s opinion. To those profiting from the neoliberal economic system, the biblical claim for social justice is counterproductive. Seen from below, the biblical claim is self-evident. Thus, Guillaume observes correctly that “[e]xploitation is always resented as extortion and injustice by the exploited.”38 He contends that “exploitation and taxation are signs of economic health that benefit everyone.” He also adds: “[A]lbeit in different proportions.”39 He certainly is not an “objective economist,” and clearly sides with those who profit from the neoliberal economic system. The question is what changes if we do not side with the winners but stand in solidarity with the victims 29 Silver, Prophets and Markets, 112–13. 30  Lester Grabbe, “Introduction and Overview,” in “Every City shall be Forsaken”: Urbanism and Prophecy in Ancient Israel and the Near East, ed. Lester Grabbe and Robert D. Haak (JSOT Sup 330; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press 2001), 34. 31  Grabbe, “Sup-urbs or Only Hyp-urbs?,” 34. 32 Otto, Sozialethische Programme, 98. 33 Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crisis, 111. 34  Ibid., 16. 35  Ibid., 225. 36 Silver, Prophets and Markets, 112. 37  Ibid., 135. 38 Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crises, 112. 39 Ibid.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   119 of globalization. The next section discusses why biblical readings from below teach academic and scholarly readers to understand better the ramifications of the Bible.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Globalized Era In my opinion, three insights help academic readers to be in solidarity with ordinary readers who suffer economic, political, and social exploitation and oppression today. The three insights relate first to discussions of global asynchrony; second, to the phenomenon that, in contrast to views about reality as being veiled, biblical texts depict reality as being unveiled; and third, to the fact that women are the first victims of oppressive and exploitative structures of domination in ancient times and today. All three insights assert that biblical texts offer adequate depictions of reality even for today.

First Insight: Global Asynchrony In 2003, the Swiss philosopher and ethicist Thomas Kesselring coined the term “global asynchrony.”40 The phrase “global asynchrony” means that fully developed economies exist next to developing economies and economies on a low level of development, according to the standards of contemporary industrial capitalism. In other words, on the global level economic development is asynchronous and does not appear in a developmentally linear fashion. The phenomenon of global asynchrony benefits Bible readers who live in less developed societies. In a fully developed industrialized society, the Bible appears to be an outdated text, and so its application to actual questions demands a hermeneutical procedure. Yet to people living in a society with a low level of economic development, the Bible depicts circumstances that are quite similar to their own. Several biblical issues that are related to economic injustice and exploitation in the Bible and impoverished reading contexts come to mind. They relate to the existence of debt-slavery, the problem of land loss, unjust and delayed payment of wages and the lack of worker’s rights, the migration of people and their families, the destruction of family structures, and the prevalence of absolutely impoverished people forced to live as beggars or thieves. First, the issue of debt-slavery of children, as it appears in the biblical story of Elisha and the widow (2 Kgs. 4:1–7), is a reality for thousands of people in Pakistan, India, the Philippines, and many other Asian countries. Even today creditors take away children of indebted families and force the children to work in carpet factories, in mines, or as pearl 40  Thomas Kesselring, “Entschuldung aus kommunitaristischer Perspektive,” in Die Diskussion um ein Insolvenzrecht für Staaten: Bewertungen eines Lösungsvorschlages zur Überwindung der Internationalen Schuldenkrise, ed. Martin Dabrowski, Andreas Fisch, Karl Gabriel, and Christoph Lienkamp (Volkswirtschaftliche Schriften 530; Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2003), 158.

120   Rainer Kessler divers. When the enslaved child dies because of harsh working conditions, the debt holder returns to the family and takes the next child, if the debt is not yet fully repaid. Families suffering such a fate immediately understand the point of the story about Elisha and the widow, and they do not need additional explanations. Their comprehension of the unjust economic structures as culpable of the child’s fate is immediate and direct. Second, another issue of global asynchrony that accommodates ordinary readers’ understanding of the Bible relates to the issue of land loss. For the majority of people living in the industrial and administrative centers of the world, the issue of land distribution is abstract. Yet in many African countries the problem of land-grabbing is a contemporary issue for small farmers. When they lose their land, they have to work as wageworkers on farms owned by somebody else. Hence, small farmers see their troubles described in the book of Isaiah: “Ah, you who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is room for no one but you, and you are left to live alone in the midst of the land” (Isa. 5:8, NRSV). Small farmers who lose their land also understand the hopes expressed in the law of Leviticus 25 that promises the restitution of land. African exegete Temba Mafico underlines the similarity of the concept about land ownership in ancient Israel and modern Africa when he states: “Traditions of land ownership in Africa and ancient Israel have as their foundation the basic idea expressed in Ps. 24:1–2: that God, the creator and founder of the earth, all living things and all that is in it, is the primary owner of the land.”41 Mafico’s Zimbabwean colleague, Robert Wafawanaka, thus explains: “Leviticus 25:23 states unequivocally, ‘The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; for you are strangers and sojourners with me.’ ”42 Later he adds: “The problem of land possession is timeless and without national boundaries.”43 This statement is correct in principal, but people from the center, especially members of academia, need to hear from marginalized readers in order to learn about this economic reality still prevalent today. For readers from below, the problem of land possession is not timeless but an urgent question. Another Bible scholar also observes the similarities between the Bible and impoverished women in Brazil, as they relate to land loss. Susann Schüepp reports that both poor Brazilian women and biblical women lack access to arable land. In Brazil a significant movement of landless peasants exists (Movimento Sem Terra). To the people of this movement, the Exodus story speaks directly about their lives, as they observe: “[T]he Exodus says a lot to peasants today: the search for land, a land flowing with milk and honey (o Êxodo fala muito para os camponeses hoje: a busca pela terra, terra que corre leite e mel).”44 Land loss and the quest for land ownership are thus highly contemporary issues for ordinary readers living in economically underdeveloped countries. 41  Temba L. J. Mafico, “Land Concept and Tenure in Israel and African Tradition,” in Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Interpretations, ed. Musa W. Dube/Andrew M. (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 235. 42  Robert Wafawanaka, “ ‘The Land Is Mine!’ Biblical and Postcolonial Reflections on Land with Particular Reference to the Land Issue in Zimbabwe,” in Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Interpretations, ed. Musa W. Dube, Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora Mbuwayesango (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 221. 43  Ibid., 232. 44 Schüepp, Bibellektüre, 187.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   121 Third, economic asynchrony also relates to a country’s industrial developments and the social conditions they produce. Often, they relate to unjust and delayed salary payments and the lack of worker’s rights. Nowadays, most impoverished countries are industrialized. Thousands of former peasants work in factories producing commodities for export to Europe and North America. Often these factory workers labor under hazardous safety and working conditions that characterized European and American factories during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries prior to the legalization of worker’s rights and a unionized labor force. Yet factory workers in China, Bangladesh, the Philippines, and other impoverished countries do not have the protection of unions and thus lack fundamental worker’s rights even today. One of the most important worker’s rights relates to getting one’s wages paid on time. Biblical texts address the problem of wage delays and wage theft, indicating that the on-time payment of wages was a problem then. For instance, a law in Deuteronomy commands: “You shall not withhold the wages of poor and needy laborers, whether other Israelites or aliens who reside in your land in one of your towns. You shall pay them their wages daily before sunset, because they are poor and their livelihood depends on them” (Deut. 24:14–15, NRSV). The prophet Malachi mentions that the law was not followed. He announces judgment against those “who oppress the hired workers in their wages” (Mal. 3:5, NRSV). The problem has not changed much today. Fourth, another serious problem of today’s global asynchrony in the economic realm pertains to the dramatic increase of global migration. The reasons for people leaving their native countries are often the same as in biblical times. They relate to wars and violence, economic distress, or the lack of a viable economic future. Consequently, migrants live in forced or voluntary exiles. Their experiences are useful to those who have not been forced to move to other countries on a permanent basis. Justo L. González explains: “In exile, one leaves what has been the center of one’s life and moves to the periphery. . . . No matter what the reason the land that our eyes first saw can no longer sustain the life of peace and joy that God intends. As we look back to those lands, many of us can say with the prophet: We get our bread at the peril of our lives because of the sword in the wilderness. Our skin is black as an oven.”45 Migration is thus a huge issue in our time, too. Fifth, another phenomenon common to biblical texts and asynchronously organized contemporary societies relates to the issue of family structures destroyed by poverty and economic injustice. Poverty forces many Southern Asian people to migrate and search for jobs in other countries where they often work under slave-like conditions. In the process, families are separated. Another factor in the dissolution of families is the problem of men fathering children and then leaving them. In poor neighborhoods around the globe, millions of women raise their children who were conceived with different fathers. The situation is similar to situations found in the Bible. Women live in homes without their disappeared husbands (Mic. 2:9). The book of Micah articulates the total destruction of neighborhood, friendship, and family relations in this way: “Put no trust in a friend, have no confidence in a loved one; guard the doors of your mouth from her 45 Justo L. González, Santa Biblia: The Bible through Hispanic Eyes (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press 1996), 91.

122   Rainer Kessler who lies in your embrace; for the son treats the father with contempt, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; your enemies are members of your own household” (Mic.`7:5–6, NRSV). The passage is quoted again in Mt. 10:35–36 and Lk. 12:53 and thus demonstrates that asynchronic economies produce failing family structures in both biblical and contemporary times. Sixth and finally, extreme forms of poverty characterize many biblical narratives and today’s asynchronically structured societies. Increasingly, poverty also permeates societies of the global centers, which perhaps indicates that globalization is striking back at societies previously exempt from economic devastation. Yet compared to poverty in asynchronically organized economies, the situation of poor people is relatively better within the global centers. Thus, the following biblical text depicts the situation of poor people in the South more than in so-called developed countries. The passage of Job 24 describes the situation of people who have nothing left to live for. They are absolutely impoverished, and they represent what the nineteenth-century economic philosopher Karl Marx called the “Lumpenproletariat.” These are people forced to live like beggars and thieves. Job 24 states: “[T]he poor of the earth all hide themselves. Like wild asses in the desert they go out to their toil, scavenging in the waste-land food for their young. They reap in a field not their own and they glean in the vineyard of the wicked. They lie all night naked, without clothing, and have no covering in the cold. They are wet with the rain of the mountains, and cling to the rock for want of shelter” (Job 24:4–8, NRSV). The garbage dumps all over the globalized world are filled with people forced to live under these kinds of devastating conditions of total poverty. In sum, the existence of debt-slavery, the problem of land loss, the delayed payment of wages and the lack of worker’s rights, migration, the destruction of family structures, and the prevalence of absolutely impoverished people illustrate the similarity between the Bible and today’s asynchronically organized countries. As a result, ordinary readers from these societies have direct and immediate understanding of many biblical texts that readers from economically highly developed societies find almost incomprehensible. Since globalization ensures that not all people on the globe live under the same conditions even though they share the same time period, their economic status is asynchronous. Today’s people who live much more closely to people of biblical times thus understand the Bible without complicated interpretive assistance. Their living conditions resemble closely the conditions of people from the biblical time periods. Thus, the first insight is that readers, living in economies of a low-level development, understand biblical texts without additional explanations, in contrast to readers from fully developed economies who need so much help in comprehending biblical texts. Global asynchrony leads to different local hermeneutical abilities.

Second Insight: Biblical Texts Unveil Reality Even Today Closely linked to the phenomenon of global asynchrony is the fact that the reality of violence, oppression, and exploitation appears in a much more direct manner in biblical texts than in the complicated structures of highly developed contemporary societies.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   123 This fact often allows readers from below direct access to the meaning of biblical texts without any hermeneutical detour. I personally witnessed an incidence of direct access to biblical meaning when I visited Chile in 1989. One day I visited a particularly economically poor neighborhood. Young people handed out a handmade newspaper that had been produced by Catholic, socialist, and communist youth groups. In the midst of articles on social, economic, and political issues, I found a text entitled “Christian Reflection.” It featured a Spanish translation of Isa. 10:1–4 that the newspaper published with the title, “Those Who Organize Oppression.” I translated the Spanish title and the following quote from the article into English: Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees and with their decrees organize oppression, who rob the poor of my people of their right and turn aside the needy from justice, who leave the widow without anything and make the orphans their prey. What will they do on the day of punishment, in the calamity that will come from far away? To whom will they flee for help? Where will they leave their wealth? Nothing remains but to crouch among the prisoners or to fall among the slain. And Yahweh’s anger is not turned away, and Yahweh’s hand is stretched out still.

The article presented only the translation of Isa. 10:1–4. It did not feature any commentary or any hermeneutical effort to explain the biblical text. To the Chilean victims of globalization in 1989, the biblical poem from the eighth-century bce was self-evident because it depicted exactly the people’s situation. The text itself was enough for its readers to understand its meaning without any additional commentary or explanation. The Brazilian women with whom Susann Schüepp reads the Bible also reported that under their conditions, who the oppressors are becomes evident to them—big landowners owning large estates. Peasants who occupy small parts of the estate are killed or driven away. Farmers who own small plots of land often lose their land by the violent actions of the powerful who construct industrial plants or installations for tourist use on the land. Under these circumstances, readers from the margins directly understand what the promise of the Exodus story is. It is the promise of land to readers from below.46 Bible readers in the West who do not directly confront such dire situations, and often even benefit from them as consumers or tourists, get access to the economic meaning of the biblical texts only when they read interpretations from below. Yet in the global asynchrony of our times, situations are not always as transparent as in the Chilean or Brazilian examples. Modern land-grabbing is mostly operated by foreign countries or corporations. It is thus quite different from situations in biblical times. In the Bible peasants who lose their fields and houses know the people who take them away from them. They live in the same village or in nearby towns. Biblical texts tell many stories about rich and poor, oppressor and oppressed, exploiter and exploited who knew each other directly. For instance, the book of Proverbs mentions: “The rich and the poor meet together; Yhwh is the maker of them all” (Prov. 22:2). Legislation reckons with the possibility of slave-owners striking their male or female slaves so that they die (Exod. 46 Schüepp, Bibellektüre, 187–93.

124   Rainer Kessler 21:20) or loose an eye or tooth (Exod. 21:26–27). The prophet Jeremiah compares those who “have become great and rich” with “fowlers who set a trap; they catch human beings” (Jer. 5:26–27, NRSV). Even in the world of global asynchrony direct contact as described in the Bible still occurs today. Yet, usually, anonymity is the rule. Those who suffer from exploitation and oppression do not know the names of their exploiters and oppressors. They are confronted by agents who only do what they are told to do. These agents do not profit from the exploitation and oppression, as they themselves are often exploited. Those who are responsible profit from the system, but they remain anonymous and unknown. The “old-fashioned” biblical texts with their direct contact between those on the top and those from below hint at the fact that in today’s anonymous circumstances, some people benefit and others suffer from the system. Nowadays, who is who is less obvious. People living in Western Europe and North America have countless opportunities to stay uninformed. The exploitation of humans and the destruction of nature occur in mostly hidden ways. The reading of biblical texts from a pre-modern world forces contemporary readers in developed countries to ask about the real costs that enable a high standard of living. They will learn that individual people benefit from structures of oppression and not from societies as a whole. Perhaps they also discover that they are the ones benefiting from the current economic disparities implemented by neoliberal ideology. Contemporary critics often accuse biblical prophets of exaggeration and bias. This strategy is not false. The prophets of the Hebrew Bible do not speak as sociologists or statisticians according to whom an economy is not “healthy”47 when people are exploited. In biblical times, too, some people thought they had nothing to do with exploitation and oppression. According to the prophet Hosea, his Ephraimite contemporaries exclaimed: “Ah, I am rich, I have gained wealth for myself; in all of my gain no offence has been found in me that would be sin” (Hos. 12:8, NRSV; Hebr. 12:9). Hosea accuses them of being traitors in whose hands are false balances; they are people who “love to oppress” (v. 7; in Hebrew: v. 8). The prophet Micah is confronted with people who tell him: “Do not preach . . . one should not preach of such things; disgrace will not overtake us” (Mic. 2:6, NRSV). They have no conscience of being guilty. Micah condemns them of coveting fields, seizing houses, and taking the oppressed away when the prophet observes: “They oppress householder and house, people and their inheritance” (Mic. 2:2). Instead of accusing the prophets of being “curmudgeons,”48 we should be grateful that their radical utterances enable us to detect deeper realities behind the superficial rhetoric of building a “healthy” economy.

47  As mentioned in Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crisis, 122. 48  Grabbe, “Sup-urbs or Only Hyp-urbs?,” 121.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   125

Third Insight: Women Are Always the First Victims within Structures of Domination The third insight that characterizes the reading of the Bible from below and that is suspicious of neoliberal justifications by academic Bible readers who live in fully developed economies focuses on women as the victims of structures of domination. Women’s situations within contemporary conditions of globalization resemble the situation of biblical women, especially prostitution and slavery. First, even today young girls who live in poverty are often forced to prostitute themselves. Sometimes they are sold into slavery or given away into wealthy households of their home countries although often they are sent into households abroad. Once there, they are not only exploited as household workers but also abused sexually. This dire situation is already mentioned in a biblical law. The passage in Exod. 21:7–11 begins with the following words: “When a man sells his daughter as a slave. . . .” In this case the father is not able to pay his debt and is forced to sell a family member, his own daughter. The girl is placed into a foreign family where she not only works but is also sexually abused. The biblical law regulates this situation and tries to protect the girl. It stipulates that she must be married like a free wife who cannot be sent away if she displeases her master.49 Yet the accusations in Amos 2:7 critique that the law is not always applied. The prophet thus denounces that “father and son go in to the same girl.” The verb “to go in” refers to sexual intercourse.50 In my reading from below, the situation of the young woman resembles the enslaved girls of Exod. 21:7–11. She is enslaved in a family but instead of being married to either father or son, she is instead sexually violated by the male members of the master’s family. The contemporary female household worker who pays for her family’s debt reminds me of these biblical passages. Reading them from below gives the contemporary situations the name they deserve: they are about slavery. The contemporary situation for impoverished young women is indeed grave. The Global Slavery Index, an annual study of world-wide slavery conditions published by the Australian Walk Free Foundation indicates how slavery functions in the today’s world. The study estimates that 45.8 million people were enslaved in 2016. One reason for their enslavement is debt. When a highly indebted father of a family dies, creditors often take the family’s children away to have them work off the father’s debt. Widows and their children—the classical “widows and orphans”—are still the weakest members in many societies, as they were in biblical times according to many biblical texts, such as Exod. 22:22, Deut. 14:29, Isa. 1:23, Jer. 7:6, and Mal. 3:5. Reports about contemporary causes for turning fatherless children into debt slaves shed light on many biblical stories, such as the already mentioned narrative in 2 Kgs. 4:1–7. As long as the father is alive, creditors do not bother the family. After the death of the father, however, the creditor 49 Gregory C. Chirichigno, Debt-Slavery in Israel and the Ancient Near East (JSOT.S 141; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993), 244–54. 50 Shalom M. Paul, Amos: A Commentary on the Book of Amos (Hermeneia; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1991), 82.

126   Rainer Kessler shows up and takes away both children. It is impossible to imagine that the action of the creditor in 2 Kgs. 4:1–7 could be understood as “a charitable act out of which neither party made a fortune,” as Guillaume contends in his reading.51 Only followers of a neoliberal economic logic that classifies economic exploitation as “healthy”52 come up with such a callous and ruthless reading. Another biblical text illustrates the devastating consequences for women and their children when their male provider perishes. The passage in Micah 2 describes how the male head of a family encounters economic oppression. Verses 1–2 mention that the “devisers of wickedness and plotters of evil” do “violence to a man and his house, a man and his inheritance.”53 As a result, the man loses his worldly possession and disappears. Several verses later the woman and her children are driven away. The text is written as an accusation, stating: “You have driven out the women of my people from their pleasant houses. You have taken away from their children my glory forever (Mic. 2:9).”54 Contemporary situations help us to comprehend what happens to the women. They live under poorest conditions and lack a male breadwinner in a kyriarchal economic setting. The biblical text indicates the different fate for women and men. A man loses his possession and then leaves his family. A woman stays behind and continues to be responsible for her children. Women are thus economic victims in two ways: first, they lose their land when the family’s male provider disappears; second, they care for their children but lose their home and the freedom of their children. The claim that women are always the first victims in situations of economic precarity in the Bible and today demonstrates that biblical texts and the contemporary globalized economic order illuminate each other, if we read the Bible from below.

The Ongoing Challenges of Reading from Below: Concluding Comments This essay argues that all of us benefit from biblical readings from below because they illustrate the similarities between today’s economically marginalized Bible readers and the situations described in the Bible. The similarity explains why economically marginalized Bible readers find it so easy to read biblical texts in a direct, immediate, and unencumbered way, without requiring complicated hermeneutical maneuvers. Readers from Europe and North America can thus learn from ordinary readers living in the southern hemisphere, but neoliberal assumptions and convictions make it difficult for European and North American readers to be open-minded and appreciative listeners to exegetical positions from below. 51 Guillaume, Land, Credit and Crisis, 167. 52  Ibid., 122. 53  Translation by Ralph L. Smith, Micah-Malachi (WBC 32; Waco, TX: Word Books, 1984), 23. 54  Ibid., 25.

Reading the Bible from Below in the Era of Globalization   127 As a European scholar in a traditional academic institution, I would like to end my analysis with a warning directed to myself. Reading from below must be informed by the experiences of people from below. I must be careful not to project my own ideas onto them. African scholar Justin Ukpong (1940–2011) reports on a popular reading process in Nigeria. Ukpong compares the Nigerian reading with a control group from Glasgow. He describes that the Scottish readers’ “motives for reading the bible were meant as guidance, support and solace.” For him, Scottish readers offer traditional ideas about reading the Bible. Ukpong observes that, in contrast to the European readers, African readers are primarily interested in establishing how the Bible could protect them against the power of evil spirits. He addresses the African readerly concerns when he states: “That the majority of the research population were interested in and were even preoccupied with spiritual protection against evil forces in their use of the bible strongly betrays the influence of their culture because these are the main preoccupations of the African Traditional Religions.”55 I add to Ukpong’s description that neither the Scottish nor the Nigerian readers were interested in questions about the economy and the social situations in biblical texts. We must not have a romanticized or idealized notion of ordinary readers from below. We must not expect them to read what we want them to read. We should listen to them even if they speak of evil spirits and not of social and economic problems. And we should try to understand what they mean by it, even if it is not easy for European or NorthAmerican academic scholars. In spite of this warning, I think that we can learn a lot from ordinary readers. My impression is that we only are at the very beginning of understanding the importance of readings from below and of listening to ordinary Bible readers who come from ­economic situations that are considerably more similar to the biblical world than the neoliberal economic structures so prevalent in European and North American societies. When we read the Bible from below, we have a much better chance to not reinforce intellectually, exegetically, and theologically globalized economic structures of exploitation, oppression, and sources of injustice to the vast majority of people in our world.

Bibliography Dube, Musa W., ed. Other Ways of Reading: African Women and the Bible. Atlanta, GA: SBL/ Geneva: WCC Publications, 2001. Dube, Musa W., Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora Mbuwayesango, eds. Postcolonial Perspectives in African Biblical Interpretations. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. González, Justo  L. Santa Biblia: The Bible through Hispanic Eyes. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press 1996. 55  Quotes from Justin S. Ukpong, “Popular Readings of the Bible in Africa and Implications for Academic Readings: Report on the Field Research Carried out on Oral Interpretation of the Bible in Port Harcourt, Metropolis, Nigeria under the Auspices of the Bible in Africa Project, 1991–94,” in The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories, and Trends, ed. Gerald O. West and Musa W. Dube (Boston, MA / Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2001), 592.

128   Rainer Kessler Segovia, Fernando F. Decolonizing Biblical Studies: A View from the Margins. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000. Sugirtharajah, R. S. Postcolonial Criticism and Biblical Interpretation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002, repr. 2009. West, Gerald  O. The Academy of the Poor: Towards a Dialogical Reading of the Bible. Pietermaritzburg: Cluster Publications, 2003. West, Gerald O., and Musa W. Dube, eds. The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories, and Trends. Boston, MA / Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2001. de Wit, Hans, and Janet Dyk, eds. Bible and Transformation: The Promise of Intercultural Bible Reading. Semeia Studies 81. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2015. de Wit, Hans, and Gerald O. West, eds. African and European Readers of the Bible in Dialogue: In Quest of a Shared Meaning. Studies of Religion in Africa 32. Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill, 2008. de Wit, Hans, Louis C. Jonker, Marleen Kool, and Daniel Schipani, eds. Through the Eyes of Another: Intercultural Reading of the Bible. Elkart, IN / Amsterdam: Institute of Mennonite Studies/Vrije Universiteit, 2004.

chapter 9

Towa r d a n A fr ica n Fem i n ist Ethics a n d the Book of Prov er bs Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde

This essay argues that a feminist African ethics must be based on different principles than Western Socratic-Aristotelian ethics. Similar to Woman Wisdom in Proverbs 1–9, the former centers on the traditional African communitarian notions of care and empathy. The latter resembles the Strange Woman in Proverbs 1–9. Like her, a Western ethics invites Africans to join the West, but it is dangerous to respond to the invitation. Both ethical paradigms exist in the book of Proverbs and in contemporary post-independent and postcolonial Africa. Native wisdom and foreign wisdom appear side by side in daily African life in a hybrid fashion. Their proximity and simultaneous presence foster the illusion of a unified ethics, but it is an antithetical and even counter-ethical system, feeding folly or strangeness within its practitioners. Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman thus illustrate two systems of African ethics. One is moral and local whereas the other is immoral and foreign. Since both of them operate in tandem in the African context, the current ethical paradigm blends in strange ways. It is an amalgam of elements that are strange to an African feminist ethics. The book of Proverbs represents a helpful biblical text to explore the intersection of ethics, wisdom, and feminism in the African context. As a didactic book, Proverbs contains a deeply embedded sapiential ethics with well-known female characters. They make Proverbs a treasure trove for feminist Old Testament scholars.1 African feminist exegetes have also studied this biblical book. For instance, Madipoane Masenya (ngwana’ Mphahlele) presents an African woman’s interpretation of Proverbs 31 with 1  See, e.g., Claudia V. Camp, Wisdom and the Feminine in the Book of Proverbs (Sheffield: Almond, 1985); Christine Roy Yoder, Wisdom as a Woman of Substance: A Socioeconomic Reading of Proverbs 1–9 and 31:10–31 (BZAW 304; Berlin / New York, NY: Walter de Gruyter, 2001); Nancy Nam Hoon Tan, The “Foreignness” of the Foreign Woman in Proverbs 1–9: A Study of the Origin and Development of a Biblical Motif (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008).

130   funlọla o. ọlọjẹde her creatively developed and contextualized bosadi hermeneutics.2 My own work engages Proverbs within the African context, arguing for a gender-sensitive and genderbalanced reading focused on both positive and negative characterizations of both women and men.3 In short, the book of Proverbs provides important biblical images and topics for the development of a feminist African ethics grounded in the Bible. Yet African theologians, ethicists, and exegetes have largely ignored the link between biblical ethics and feminism. I examined previously the dearth of scholarship on the ethics in Proverbs, not to mention feminist research on the ethical vision of this biblical book.4 The scholarly silence is even worse in African biblical hermeneutics where a general apathy toward sapiential texts predominates. Neither feminist nor African nor feminist African exegetes examine the competing ethical paradigms, as they emerge in Proverbs in general and in the depiction of Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman in chapters 1–9. This essay fills the gap not only for African biblical hermeneutics but also for the development of a sapiential ethics in general. Discussing the speeches of Woman Wisdom in Proverbs 1–9 as a point of departure, the essay argues that social location and experiences of African women ought to be central for an African feminist ethics. After an outline of the speeches made by Woman Wisdom, the essay suggests that various elements in those speeches resonate with several African ethical values if they are read with a feminist lens. Pivotal is the communitarian character of traditional African ethics, marked by care and empathy. Finally, the essay juxtaposes Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman to illustrate the fusion of traditional and foreign ethical concepts in contemporary African ethical discourse. A feminist African ethics must recognize the tension inherent in the post-independent and postcolonial African context and develop ethical principles different from the Western Socratic-Aristotelian ethics.

Toward the Development of an African Feminist Ethics The articulation of an African feminist ethics is a complicated task. While it must take its cues from African ethics, it also has to prioritize the concerns of African women. It rejects hegemonic ethical ideas sometimes prevalent in African ethics that ignore or 2  Madipoane J. Masenya (ngwana’ Mphahlele), How Worthy Is the Woman of Worth? Rereading Proverbs 31-10-31 in African-South Africa (New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2004). 3  Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde, “A Gender-Sensitive Methodology in African Biblical Interpretation: Insights from the Book of Proverbs,” in Navigating African Biblical Hermeneutics: Trends and Themes from Our Pots and Our Calabashes, ed. Madipoane J. Masenya (ngwana’ Mphahlele) and Kenneth Ngwa (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2018), 40–55. 4  Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde, “Woman Wisdom and the Ethical Vision of the Book of Proverbs: An African Reflection,” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 71.3 (2015): https://www.ajol.info/index.php/hts/ article/view/119005.

Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs   131 even deny the autonomy and dignity of African women. At the same time, an African feminist ethics shares some concerns with feminist ethical systems developed in other geopolitical contexts, but its focus is always on African women. On the conceptual level, two important elements characterize a specifically African feminist ethics. They pertain to the considerations of social location and the experiences of African women. First, an African feminist ethics ought to stress the significance of social location. Feminist scholars from the global South observe that usually Western feminist ethical proposals ignore matters of social location as a concern. They also ignore issues of class and race in their analyses. African feminist ethicists therefore criticize this tendency in Western feminist ethics. For instance, Oyèrónké Oyewùmí states: “Women are not just women; factors of race, class, regional origins, age, and kinship ties are central to the understanding of inter-gender and intro-gender relations, locally and globally.”5 Similarly, African feminists contend that feminism is generally ethnocentric and regularly U.S.-American and Eurocentric. Western feminism greatly misrepresents and stereotypes Africa and African women, and it even has a “tendency to baseless generalizations,” as the African scholar, Olufẹmi Taiwo, bluntly argues in respect of scholarship in general.6 Consequently, African feminists want to articulate a distinct endogenous African feminism.7 As Oyewùmí explains: “Feminism, without a doubt, elucidates the European worldview and the socio-political organizations and processes that flow from it.”8 We need to develop our own contextualized African feminist ethics that is grounded in endogenous African realities, experiences, and contexts. Importantly, feminist biblical scholars have conveyed the significance of one’s social location. Accordingly, feminist exegetes read biblical texts from different perspectives because they recognize that different feminist readers are located in diverse socio-political and geographical settings. For instance, African American women read biblical texts differently from Latin American women.9 In line with the hermeneutical insight that social location matters, some African feminist exegetes thus advocate for postcolonial feminist interpretations of the Bible in challenge to dominant androcentric and 5  Oyèrónké Oyewùmí, “The White Woman’s Burden: African Women in Western Feminists Discourse,” in African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood, ed. Oyèrónké Oyewùmí (Trenton, NJ / Asmara: African World Press, 2003), 40. 6  Olufẹmi Taiwo, “Feminism and Africa: Reflections on the Poverty of Theory,” in African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood, ed. Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí (Trenton, NJ / Asmara: Africa World Press, 2003), 60. 7  Obioma Nnaemeka, “Foreword: Locating Feminism/Feminists”, in The Dynamics of African Feminism: Classifying African Feminist Literatures, ed. Susan Arndt (Trenton, NJ / Asmara: Africa World Press, 2002), 14. For a detailed discussion, see Funlọla O. Ọlọjẹde, “Unsung Heroines of the Hebrew Bible: A Contextual Theological Reading from the Perspective of Woman Wisdom” (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation; Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch University, 2011), 19–20. 8  Oyewùmí, “The White Woman’s Burden,” 40. 9  For feminist exegetical discussions on the significance of social location in feminist biblical interpretation, see, e.g., Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, “Transforming the Legacy,” in Searching the Scriptures, Vol. 1: A Feminist Introduction, ed. Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1993), 1–24; Sharon H. Ringe, “When Women Interpret the Bible,” in Women’s Bible Commentary, ed. Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 1–9.

132   funlọla o. ọlọjẹde European-American colonizing ways of reading.10 In general, African Bible scholars, whether they are feminist or not, consider social location a central factor for biblical exegesis. They know that a postcolonial context produces a different biblical interpretation from an imperial or colonial setting. In short, social location matters greatly to an African feminist ethics of the Bible. A point of clarification is needed. The notion of social location is not necessarily synonymous with geographical or geopolitical location. An African feminist living in the United States can still read the Bible from an African perspective. Her reading does not necessarily advance a U.S.-American perspective if she identifies as an African citizen and with the African context. Many Africans live and work abroad, but their diasporic life does not necessarily give them a perspective other than an African perspective, as long as African and not diasporic norms inform their biblical readings. The same might be the case for U.S.-American or European readers who live outside of their native social locations. The original contexts of diasporic readers can thus still profoundly impact biblical interpretations and ethical considerations of African readers living abroad. Second, an African feminist ethics ought to focus on African women’s experiences. Feminist ethicists from other continents affirm the significance of this principle. For instance, Carol S. Robb states that “feminist ethical theory, in general terms, presupposes a criticism of the forces which limit women’s autonomy in the ethical realm,”11 and so it marks women’s experiences as primary for feminist ethical explorations. Women’s experiences, however, are widely divergent and different. African American ethicist Katie G. Cannon stresses this point when she asserts that “the intersection of race, sex, and class gives womanist scholars a different ethical orientation with a different ideological perspective”12 than white U.S.-American feminists. Cannon also observes that, unfortunately, white feminist ethical discussions rarely refer to the experiences of women of color. Thus, she proposes that “Black women’s moral agency must be understood on their own terms rather than being judged by essentially abstract external ideological norms and squeezed into categories and systems which consider white men the measure of significance.”13 African feminist ethicists make similar assertions. Like women of color in the United States, they find that European-American positions limit their scholarly work. In other words, European-American feminist ethics do not adequately describe African women’s 10  See, e.g., Musa W. Dube, “Rahab Says Hello to Judith: A Decolonizing Feminist Reading,” in Postcolonial Biblical Reader, ed. Musa W. Dube (Ithaca, NY: Snow Lions, 2002), 142–58; Makhosazana K. Nzimande, “Reconfiguring Jezebel: A Postcolonial Imbokodo Reading of the Story of Naboth’s Vineyard (1 Kings 21:1–16),” in African and European Readers of the Bible in Dialogue: In Quest of a Shared Meaning, ed. Hans de Wit and Gerald O. West (Studies of Religion in Africa 32; Pietermaritzburg: Cluster Publications, 2009), 223–51. 11  Carol S. Robb, “A Framework for Feminist Ethics,” in Feminist Theological Ethics: A Reader, ed. Lois K. Daly (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994), 13. 12  Katie G. Cannon, “Hitting a Straight Lick with a Crooked Stick: The Womanist Dilemma in the Development of a Black Liberation Ethic,” in Feminist Theological Ethics: A Reader, ed. Lois K. Daly (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994), 36. 13  Cannon, “Hitting a Straight Lick,” 35.

Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs   133 experiences. Yet African feminist women’s situation also differs from African American women because African feminists also share similar struggles as white women. Both black African and white women face gender discrimination from the men in their societies. For instance, they are paid less, they have fewer job opportunities, they lack equal promotion opportunities in the labor market, and they have more domestic responsibilities than the men in their families due to the relentless persistence of patriarchal traditions and habits in society. In many African countries, women are still the main care takers of children despite that they hold full time jobs like their male partners. African feminist ethicists need to probe the ongoing gender imbalance in the family and in society. Far too often tradition remains unquestioned because men still dominate the public spheres in society. In short, the two principles of social location and African women’s experiences ensure that an African feminist ethics will benefit African women today and reduce ongoing misogynist societal and religious structures in Africa. The sapiential tradition of Wisdom Woman and the Strange Woman provides important rhetorical resources to reflect on the substance and direction of an African feminist ethics for today’s African women.

Listening to Woman Wisdom in Proverbs 1–9 Three important speeches of Woman Wisdom are salient to an African feminist stance. The speeches appear in Proverbs 1, 8, and 9, depicting Woman Wisdom as a preacher of righteousness. She exhibits ethical values, such as moral integrity, honesty, prudence, and uprightness. She is also generous when she invites other people, especially young men, asking them to emulate her virtues. The positive image of this female character is reinforced in the depiction of another female character, the so-called good wife in Prov. 31:10–31. Wisdom Woman is, however, also contrasted with a rival female figure, the Strange or Foreign Woman (‘iššah zarah) in Prov. 2:16, 5:3.20, and 7:5. Both female characters are wealthy and enjoy considerable influence. They are upper-class figures (7:16–20; 9:1–6), persuading others, especially young men (7:11–12.21; 9:3.14–15), and rendering hospitality (9:2.5.17). They also speak and act in the public realm (7:8.12; 8:13; 9:3.14–15). Both of them invite naïve men to turn to them (7:18; 8:4–5; 9:4–5.14–15). Despite their similarities, both female figures are also significantly different in their words, actions, and goals. For instance, Woman Wisdom “is a preacher of righteousness who is interested in maintaining order in the community and promoting responsible citizenship.”14 In contrast, the Strange Woman is immoral and a bold-faced adulteress and seducer of young men on the righteous path. Some biblical exegetes assert that the literal depiction of the Strange Woman as an adulterer should be understood metaphorically. 14  Ọlọjẹde, “Woman Wisdom and the Ethical Vision,” 6.

134   funlọla o. ọlọjẹde She is regarded as a woman of foreign nationality who is a social outsider, perhaps even a prostitute, promoting foreign worship and practices or a foreign goddess such as Ishtar.15 The biblical interpreter, Johann Cook, adheres to this reading of the Strange Woman in Proverbs. In his view, the Strange Woman “can be only one foreign dangerous wisdom, namely, Greek philosophy of the kind encountered in the Hellenistic period.”16 Accordingly, Cook views the Strange Woman as a metaphoric reference to wisdom that is foreign to the people living in the Yehud. Interestingly, scholars do not usually refer to Woman Wisdom in metaphorical ways. The three poems in 1:20–31, 8:1–36, and 9:1–6 describe the female figure as a peripatetic preacher in search of students. She walks in the streets, lectures in the public square and at the entrance of the city gate, on the hilltop, and at the crossroad where she speaks loudly to draw the attention of especially young, naïve, or foolish men (1:22; 8:4–5). She asks them to embrace wisdom and understanding (1:22; 8:1.5). In the first poem she seems desperate, frustrated, and perhaps even perplexed that some listeners choose folly and naïveté and not wisdom and knowledge. In the second poem she explains why her audience should listen to her. Her credentials are impeccable. She speaks clearly, is wise, and is of unquestionable character (8:6–9.20). She is wealthy and is generous to whoever chooses to embrace her wisdom, knowledge, counsel, discretion, and prudence (8:18.21). In the third poem she seems to have changed because her persona is different (9:1–6). She is well-established in her house and she enjoys the services of many maids. She is a wealthy woman who has the money to invite many guests to fancy dinners. Woman Wisdom does not go out anymore but sends her maids to bring people to her estate. Her call to embrace wisdom is backed by the dinner invitation. Her tone is more conciliatory than in the previous two speeches, as she extends friendly invitations. Her scathing words have disappeared. To biblical exegete, Daniel J. Estes, the poetry about Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman is metaphoric speech. It represents “sets of abstractions [that] constitute rival ethical systems that compete for the allegiance not just of the young, but of all humans.”17 In his view, “Woman Wisdom incarnates the ethical path of wisdom that is set against the path of folly pictured by the Strange Woman.”18 Both paths of wisdom and of folly correspond to righteousness and evil or wickedness. They represent what Estes classifies as “contrasting ethical paradigms.”19 The ethics of Woman Wisdom is grounded in the fear of God whereas the behavior of the Strange Woman shuns God. Estes thus asserts that “Prov 1–9 is not just a tale of two women” but “a tale of two ethical systems which are

15  See explanations of this point in Joseph Blenkinsopp, “The Social Context of the ‘Outsider Woman’ in Proverbs 1–9,” Biblica 72.4 (1991): 457–73 (462–65, 466–67). 16  Cook, “‫( ׁהרז ה שא‬Proverbs 1–9 Septuagint),” 474. 17  Daniel J. Estes, “What Makes the Strange Woman of Proverbs 1–9 Strange?,” in Ethical and Unethical in the Old Testament: God and Humans in Dialogue, ed. Katharine J. Dell (New York, NY: T&T Clark, 2010), 162. 18 Ibid. 19  Ibid., 164.

Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs   135 pictured by the Strange Woman and Woman Wisdom.”20 The choice is ours, but it is not difficult to make because the Strange Woman prefers “autonomy that rejects Yahweh as the ethical basis for life” and it is this rejection “that makes the Strange Woman strange.”21 What then is the significance of Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman for an African feminist ethics?

The Communitarian Outlook of Woman Wisdom as a Foundation for an Endogenous African Ethics The significance of the female characters in Proverbs 1–9 for an African feminist ethics is not difficult to convey. The speeches of Woman Wisdom focus on communitarian values as central elements of the ethics articulated in the book of Proverbs. Woman Wisdom embodies the ethical ideals, values, and principles that characterize the communitarian concerns of the endogenous African ethics. Such an ethics cares for vulnerable members in society, and it upholds the virtues of honesty, integrity, probity, sexual morality, and good neighborliness. Foremost, such an ethics promotes the common good. Thus, the ethics of Woman Wisdom does not only correlate to contemporary African sensibilities, but it also provides the foundation for developing an endogenous African ethics with feminist concerns in mind.22 Woman Wisdom is central in this ethics. Her speeches depict a strong woman who has a powerful voice. She is an independent campaigner who walks in the streets and talks with people. She exhibits clear leadership qualities not only in the public but also at home where she commands a retinue of maids. She plans well-organized gala dinners with a huge number of guests. She is a strong, capable, and disciplined woman of impeccable integrity and considerable wisdom. An African feminist ethics needs to emphasize this woman’s abilities, especially in sharp contrast to the many male African politicians who take advantage of the African peoples. They walk in the streets, make all kinds of promises, and then after they are elected into office betray everyone. They are full of falsehood and deceit, failing to deliver on their election promises; they lack integrity and honor. Thus they are the opposite of Woman Wisdom and do not adhere to the communitarian values that an endogenous African ethics propagates. An African feminist ethics rejects the values of the current generation of African politicians and instead stresses the alternative ethical values as Woman Wisdom embodies them. Her example should mold the leadership qualities for African politicians. They would then advance the welfare of the community, reject individual selfishness, and refuse to enrich themselves and their families with public funds. The depiction of Woman Wisdom should be the 20  Ibid., 165. 21 Ibid. 22  Ọlọjẹde, “Woman Wisdom and the Ethical Vision,” 1–6.

136   funlọla o. ọlọjẹde prototype for anybody seeking to hold public office in African countries, especially those nations that appear on the bottom of the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI).23 Importantly, Woman Wisdom does not only advocate honesty, integrity, wisdom, and counsel, but she also shares her material resources (8:18.21). Her repeated sharing communicates the communitarian ideals that an African feminist ethics seeks to encourage. Woman Wisdom invites many people to come to her dinner parties and to enjoy the exquisite food delicacies (9:1–6). She is a community-oriented person who seeks to enhance the common good in her society. She cares and has empathy for those who lack resources (9:4). She is attentive to those who are poor and exist in abject living conditions. She cares enough to act. This female figure thus illustrates the values of an endogenous African ethics. It must contain calls for care and empathy although these qualities are heavily gendered in African patriarchal society and some feminists have thus questioned them.24 Yet in the daily presence of undeniable poverty, hunger, and human degradation, an African feminist ethics finds it easy to identify with Woman Wisdom’s invitation to share wealth, food, and personal resources. Woman Wisdom’s calling of the poor and the street hooligans to the banquet table illustrates communitarian values rooted in acts of care and empathy toward the poor and oppressed, many of whom are women and girls.

The Strange Woman as a Reflection of the Western Foreign Ethics in Africa In contrast, the figure of the Strange Woman expresses the foreignness of much in African contemporary society. She is a character from the outside and foreign, perhaps because of ethnic, familial, religious, marital, or moral differences.25 Her actions are portrayed as morally inferior. They also have negative outcomes for those who succumb to her seductive speech. She is the opposite of Woman Wisdom and her words are not like the wisdom teacher whom people should follow.26 Perhaps the juxtaposition of Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman are part of a deliberate strategy to underline the divergent ethical visions articulated in the book of Proverbs. One of the women is the epitome of wisdom whereas the other woman is the epitome of folly and sexual impropriety. Both stand side by side, and strange wisdom operates next to divinely approved wisdom. One ethical system is local and the other ethical system is foreign. Both of them represent two antithetical ethical ways of life in Africa. 23  Transparency International publishes the CPI annually. The Index ranks countries based on the perception of evidence of corruption in government institutions and the public sector. 24  Rosemary Tong, Feminine and Feminist Ethics (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth: Thomson Learning, 2002), 89. 25  Estes, “What Makes the Strange Woman,” 153. 26  Ibid., 154–7.

Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs   137 According to Olufemi Taiwo, African issues and African peoples have been ­ isrepresented in European and North American scholarship, media, and politics.27 m Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí confirms that the Western culture of misrepresentation devalues African experiences “and leads to the silencing of African voices in the articulation of their own experiences.”28 In light of this powerful observation, one might conclude that hardly anything is traditional anymore in traditional African ethics. According to many researchers, the traditional African ethics ought to be centered on ubuntu or botho, a concept at the core of our humanness. Ubuntu or botho is, in fact, what makes us human. Yet like with most African issues during the past five centuries, the traditional African ethics contains many aspects of patriarchal, imperialist, colonial, and modern ideologies. In addition, globalization, free market trade, urbanization, neoliberalism, racism, and neo-colonialism, as well as other subterranean forces have stripped the traditional African ethics of the last vestiges of its indigeneity and autonomy. Nowadays, an eclectic mix of ethical values on the African scene is difficult to deny. Any effort to develop a coherent theory of African ethics, an ethics of African biblical hermeneutics, or even an African feminist ethics, must take account of this fusion. Do the women figures in Proverbs thus not reflect the ongoing tensions in African  post-independent and postcolonial ethical paradigms today? The Western Socratic-Aristotelian model of ethics dictates the rules of hermeneutics, including in biblical interpretation. The Western conception of ethics prioritizes the individual and personal autonomy over against the communitarian way of life. It insists on René Descartes’ dictum of cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am). It is a “strange” model of ethics in the context of an endogenously developed African ethical paradigm. The latter promotes communitarianism, care, and empathy. It proclaims: “I am because we are.”29 An African ethics considers communitarian or relational values and principles of the people despite the fact that no single unified “African ethic” exists. Yet there are “many commonalities and points of agreement with regard to ‘ethnic morality’—that is, traditional African ethics.”30 It resembles the ethical system represented by Woman Wisdom, superseding the unethical system represented by the Strange Woman. Yet in post-independent and postcolonial Africa, the endogenous ethics has given way to the foreign ethics. Or perhaps the endogenous ethics is subsumed by the foreign. As a result, contemporary African life has merged both ethical models into a confused blending of both. The book of Proverbs suggests that both models, represented by Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman, operate in tandem, leaving behind the familiar ethics of Woman Wisdom. This interpretation of the Strange Woman as a reflection of the Western SocraticAristotelian ethics as strange or foreign in the African context should, however, not be 27  Taiwo, “Feminism and Africa,” 45–6. 28  Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí, “Introduction: Feminism, Sisterhood, and Other Foreign Relations,” in African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood (ed. Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí; Trenton, NJ / Asmara: Africa World Press, 2003), 1–24 (15). 29  Bénézet Bujo, Foundations of an African Ethic: Beyond the Universal Claims of Western Morality (trans. from the German by Brian McNeil; New York, NY: Crossroad, 2011), 4. 30  Kai Horsthemke, Animals and African Ethics (Hampshire, NH: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015), 3.

138   funlọla o. ọlọjẹde misunderstood to mean that Western ethics as a strange ethics is foolish or immoral. The interpretation suggests merely that within the African context, the familiar, endogenous, and communitarian ethical approach to life stands in tension to the foreign, individual, and Western ethics. The tension poses serious challenges for the development of an African feminist ethics today because at stake is the ethical coherence, allegiances, and recommendations for people living in African lands. The book of Proverbs in general and the two female figures of Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman offer an intriguing opportunity to reflect on the post-independent and postcolonial African context. Shall we follow communitarian values of care and empathy more strictly than African people currently do? Diversity, hybridity, and many cultural and political choices characterize African societies. How shall an African feminist ethics, grounded in biblical readings, direct contemporary African people who seek guidance and advice? What is increasingly obvious is the fact that an African feminist ethics is a strange bedfellow with Western feminist ethics. The former must identify ethical guidelines that address its particular social location and be centered on the experiences of African women, but how to get there remains challenging. The paradox that marks African ethics has to do with the liminality, the hybridity, the tension, and the dilution that is now inherent in its expression. It is similar to the two contrasting female figures in Proverbs. Native wisdom and foreign wisdom appear daily in hybrid ways. Correspondingly, the contemporary African ethical system is founded both on wisdom and on folly or strangeness. In the world of Proverbs, daily life means living with that tension, and with the awareness of the proximity of both the wise and the strange, the ethical and the unethical.

Communitarian Values, Care, and Empathy in African Feminist Ethical Deliberations: Toward a Conclusion The development of an African feminist ethics is not a simple task in light of the complex histories and traditions of the African continent with its many people. One insight seems, however, certain. An African feminist ethics can find valuable resources in the book of Proverbs to articulate the complexities of African women and people. We have to recognize that the project of an African ethics cannot become an autonomous or “original” project because a strange Western ethical program, based on foreign paradigms and values, has influenced African thought for centuries. The study of Woman Wisdom and the Strange Woman, however, also suggests that communitarian values of care and empathy ought to define an African feminist ethics. Ours is not an individualistic and autonomous identity but it is connected to our fellow humans. An African feminist ethics thus needs to consider the specifics of the various social locations in which such an ethics speaks, and it must center on the experiences of African women. Our experiences are different from Western women and thus an African feminist ethics

Toward an African Feminist Ethics and the Book of Proverbs   139 cannot generalize about women as if the particularities of African women’s experiences did not matter. In this sense, then, this essay maintains that Woman Wisdom and her communitarian values ought to be the foundation for the development of an African feminist ethics. The integration of biblical ethics into African feminism holds much promise in the ongoing efforts to articulate African feminist ethical convictions for our continent.

Bibliography Cook, Johann. “‫ הרז השא‬hrz hva (Proverbs 1–9 Septuagint): A Metaphor for Foreign Wisdom?,” Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 106.3 (1994): 458–76. Estes, Daniel J. “What Makes the Strange Woman of Proverbs 1–9 Strange?” In Ethical and Unethical in the Old Testament: God and Humans in Dialogue, ed. Katharine J. Dell, 151–69. New York, NY: T&T Clark, 2010. Horsthemke, Kai. Animals and African Ethics. Hampshire, NH: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015. Masenya (ngwan’a Mphahlele), Madipoane J. How Worthy Is the Woman of Worth? Rereading Proverbs 31-10-31 in African-South Africa. New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2004. Ọlọjẹde, Funlọla O. “Being Wise and Being Female in Old Testament and in Africa.” Scriptura 111.3 (2012): 472–9. Ọlọjẹde, Funlọla O. “Woman Wisdom and the Ethical Vision of the Book of Proverbs: An African Reflection.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 71.3 (2015): http://dx.doi. org/10.4102/hts.v71i3.2846. Oyewùmí, Oyèrónké. “The White Woman’s Burden: African Women in Western Feminists Discourse.” In African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood, ed. Oyèrónké Oyewùmí, 25–42. Trenton, NJ / Asmara: African World Press, 2003. Robb, Carol S. “A Framework for Feminist Ethics.” In Feminist Theological Ethics: A Reader, ed. Lois K. Daly, 13–32. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Taiwo, Olufẹmi “Feminism and Africa: Reflections on the Poverty of Theory.” In African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood, ed. Oyèrónké Oyěwùmí, 45–66. Trenton, NJ / Asmara: Africa World Press, 2003.

chapter 10

L a m en t as Wom a n ist Hea li ng i n Ti m e s of Gl oba l V iol ence Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan

Scandalous, heinous sexual and domestic violence crimes in the Bible signify and ­glorify twenty-first-century violent crimes against humanity. That violence against women is a catastrophic, epidemic, global travesty surfaces in the Canadian National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. The inquiry indicates widespread disappearance and murder of over 1,200 dead and missing Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex and asexual people—a portrait of ubiquitous, violent racist and sexist stereotypes, and statesanctioned neglect, between 1980 and 2012.1 Globally, millions of women and girls daily experience violence or live with its consequences.2 Scholars/activists and people of faith need a response. Womanist activist/scholars and others committed to liberation, call for social justice, as global, domestic, sexual, and terroristic violence mount daily. Bombings of temples, churches, mosques, or synagogues and school shootings occur too frequently. Policy and protest seem ineffective. Many gun lobbyists value the right to bear arms over creating regulations making it more difficult for unstable persons to purchase weapons, 1 https://truthout.org/video/canadian-inquiry-calls-the-murder-and-disappearance-of-indigenouswomen-genocide/ [accessed June 4, 2019]. 2 http://www.religionscell.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/violence-against-women-global-scopeand-magnitude.pdf [accessed June 4, 2019]. Violence incudes intimate partner violence; sexual abuse by non-intimate partners; trafficking, forced prostitution, exploitation of labor, and debt bondage of women and girls; physical and sexual violence against prostitutes; sex selective abortion, female infanticide, and the deliberate neglect of girls; and rape in war. Many potential perpetrators include parents, spouses and partners, other family members, men in positions of power or influence, and neighbors. Most forms of violence are not unique incidents but are ongoing, and can continue for decades. Given the impact, devastation, and consequences of violence, it is almost universally under-reported.

142   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan underground markets notwithstanding. Such violence and internalized, unprocessed grief causing premature deaths, signal a need for lament. Globally, too many people hurt in silence causing intergenerational dysfunction. Too many faith traditions are often oblivious; too many police officers see city streets as combat zones and live with undiagnosed PTSD. The earth groans from the weight of grief, anger, and loss. Lament can produce avenues of awareness, witness, hope, and healing. Lament, a language that passionately expresses grief or sorrow, can help one face major and minor traumas of loss and grief within human life. Global, horrific, heinous acts of violence, anchored in fear-driven venom reveals a need for preventative measures; such dissonance and pain requires lament. Of the 150 Psalms, the majority are laments, tales of woe, and hymns of horror, where battered, broken souls cry out for relief.3 Lament questions divine justice and God’s activity with God’s creatures. Given global, individual, and personal loss ranging from rape as an act of war to persecution and displacement of immigrants and refugees, lament is a tool of grief management, family and private devotion, and pastoral care—critical when dealing with death of a loved one, job/home loss, bad divorce, and loss of self. The book of Lamentations—five poems of communal and individual mourning—also signifies and celebrates the need to engage loss and grief. Significant experiences of women in Judges 11 and 19 are so horrible that they demand lament. This essay explores lament as response to pain and suffering generated by sexual and domestic violence against self and ultimately community, from a global womanist perspective. After providing a brief overview of my womanist biblical hermeneutic, this essay: (1) explores lament as response to violent patriarchal misogyny in the lives of two unnamed biblical women in concert with global domestic violence; (2) explores lament embodied in a selected Psalm, Lamentations, and a lament by Beyoncé; and (3) concludes by invoking lament as a way to process the immediacy of daily loss and grief, globally.

Embodied Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Womanist theory invites and insists that one live in the present, study history, and engage in radical listening, to see, know, challenge, analyze, and make a difference. This epistemic, interdisciplinary field of study: takes seriously the analysis and transformation of societal and personal injustices that affect those who usually matter least in society, as symbolized by poor African diasporan women; explores living, written, oral, visual, aural, sensual, and artistic texts to create an intellectual, spiritual dialog to prepare individuals

3  G. Brooke Lester, “Psalms of Lament;” available at https://www.bibleodyssey.org/en/passages/ related-articles/psalms-of-lament [accessed May 15, 2019].

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   143 to experience life holistically. Womanist, derived by Alice Walker4 from the term “womanish,” refers to women of African descent who are audacious, outrageous, in charge, and responsible. A Womanist emancipatory theory embraces freedom, and honors the imago Dei, essential goodness in all persons. Conceptually, womanist theory5 names, questions, interprets, and helps transform the oppression of women, particularly those affected by race, gender, sexual orientation, ability, age, and class domination. Womanists engage the politics of language, where words and expressions can inspire or subjugate, vital to biblical exegesis. My womanist reading of biblical texts requires a hermeneutics of (1) tempered cynicism, (2) creativity, (3) courage, (4) commitment, (5) candor, (6) curiosity, and (7) the comedic.6 Tempered cynicism, as reasonable suspicion, invites one to question with joy of the impossible, hope of rooted faith, with scholarship that helps one appreciate complex engagement. Tempered cynicism questions how one reads lament, its therapeutic value, and if lament supports healing when violence/loss is heinous. Creativity provides a context for church and academy, where normative interpretations and traditions do not hinder new, adventurous, perhaps risky exploration of texts. Using creativity, readers/ interpreters explore complexities and uses of lament without denying or glorifying violence, noting where lament can be helpful or disappointing regarding theodicy. Courage provides a cushion when analysis feels redundant or mysterious; offers a setting where readers ask more questions, placing violence and lament in dialog, where cultural artifacts provide understanding for hidden meanings within lament. Commitment to in-depth hearing and just, appropriate living of texts frame the process of significant discovery; and amidst lament makes room for profound encounter and healing, so readers do not valorize violence, nor underestimate lament’s power. Candor reveals oppression within texts and communities that embrace and produce oppressive faith, calling to awareness how violent scriptures need to be exegeted to expose patriarchal misogyny— and the pain processed through lament. Curiosity presses one to seek the sacred to push toward heightened inclusivity, mercy, justice, and love, and engages lament to move broken humanity towards heightened openness, well-being, and capacity to engage self and neighbor in love. The comedic reminds us not to take ourselves so seriously that we cease to grow and respect other modes of interpretation, despite disagreement. Lament allows readers to agree to disagree without being disagreeable. By walking in another’s shoes, one may find more value in humanity, and lament as gift.

4  Alice Walker, In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens: Womanist Prose (New York, NY: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1983), xi. 5  Womanist theory includes but is not limited to the vast dimensions of theology, Bible and narratives, ethics, and context. Womanism is global and interfaith. Many differentiate from the embodiment of womanism and the capacity to utilize womanist theory in analysis. 6  See my first foray into designing a womanist biblical hermeneutic: “Hot Buttered Soulful Tunes and Cold Icy Passionate Truths: The Hermeneutics of Biblical Interpolation in R&B (Rhythm and Blues)” in African Americans and the Bible: Sacred Texts and Social Textures, ed. Vincent Wimbush (New York, NY: Continuum, 2000), 782–803.

144   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan Womanist biblical scholars deal with the absurdity of oppression: calling for justice, new interpretations, accountability, and change, where every person is important and relational. Womanist biblical theology merges theology or God-talk that emerges out of the rich yet oppressive experience of women of African descent to examine and learn from biblical texts towards doing justice for all. This perspective explores individual and social behavior dialogically with a God/Spirit who cares, and who abhors those who violate humanity. In contrast, globalization is a business marketplace practice of designing and developing financial, technical, personnel, marketing, managerial, and other enterprise decisions to facilitate economic integration and worldwide interdependence of countries. As such, globalization ignores traditional political boundaries and geographical limitations. Historically, globalization emerged with colonialism, voyages of discovery, land theft via manifest destiny, imperial hubris, and freebooting conquest. Technological advance and interdependence make globalization critical for understanding economic, political, cultural, ecological, and demographic interconnectedness. Globalization includes the fluid mix of transnational entities, production, people, investment, and information, and constructs a new sociocultural, economic, political world order.7 Globalization exploits and commodifies people, and shifts power to colonialist and empiricist oppressors.8 Womanist biblical praxis questions: the impact of globalization on lives of poor women; personal and societal complicity; and how a caring community can make a difference. A womanist reading critiques systemic violence, where lament creates catharsis. Those who suffer can name violence, not be victims, know justice, and move toward individual and community activism.

Lament as a Response to Violent Patriarchal Misogyny Biblical violence is theological, personal, communal, gendered, and ethnocentric. The biblical God reflects long-suffering, loving, and faithful yet demanding, violent characteristics. God exacts violence in creation and control, beginning with Genesis. Sometimes biblical violence functions as a story movement for a higher purpose, and goes unpunished. Any crimes perpetrated against females are crimes against their father or husband, not a personal crime against the victim. Silence is often a culprit. Terrorism is communal violence often emerging amid colonialism, economic insecurity, militarization, and ethnocentrism. Deuteronomic war codes incorporate gender as an organizing category for human experience: males are subject to warfare’s violence; women are deemed naturally inferior. While some argue that biblical sexual violence is literary not 7  Alison Brysk and Gershon Shafir, eds., “Introduction,” in People Out of Place: Globalization, Human Rights, and the Citizenship Gap (London / New York, NY: Routledge, 2004), 3. 8  Ibid., 5.

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   145 historical, the prevalence of rape suggests ancient Israel is male rape culture, where women cannot have their bodily integrity.9 Within the Hebrew Bible, New Testament, Greco-Roman culture, and early church history, from Socrates, Aristotle, and Plato to Augustine and Aquinas, most philosophers and scholars view women as incomplete men.10 The phallus embodies power: male is self-superior, rational, virile, masterful, and noble; the female is irrational, sexual, animal, and potentially dangerous; male honor, female shame. Male sexuality is aggressive; female sexuality is controlled. Male as penetrator and female as penetrated establishes male sexuality as dominant or superior in totality and women inferior. This bifurcation of human selves remains central to many Christian doctrines and practical theology.11 Scripture reflects stories of violence and sacrifice of women for the sake of male egos. The stories of Jephthah’s daughter and the Levite’s concubine reflect patriarchal, misogynistic violence against women, and provide pause for lament (Judges 11; 19). Although Jephthah has favor, and has no need to bargain with God to achieve victory, Jephthah volunteers to sacrifice his daughter; no ram or substitute appears. The unnamed daughter’s only request is for time with her girlfriends before going to slaughter. Daily women suffer domestic violence and out of fear fail to protest. Jephthah’s unnamed daughter metaphorically is every female murdered physically and/or psychologically. Some male desecrates her and she does not matter. While shunning occurs globally, and women die daily due to domestic violence and sexual assault or rape, these stories are complex. Violence is thorny, and victim response complicated. Jephthah’s daughter dies, and her female friends do not protest. She shows no anger at her father. Patriarchal misogyny dehumanizes and objectifies, but interpreters vary on how they view the daughter’s sacrifice, from a needless death and critique of Jephthah’s ego to celebrating the daughter’s faithfulness, wisdom, and strength, where female resistance amid gross injustice reflects engagement of human dignity.12 This father/daughter saga is about gender, violence, identity, and leadership. Jephthah’s uncertain character marginalizes him and his story is never fully integrated in Israel. His daughter’s acquiesce may be a statement of faith or victimhood. In Judges 19–20, the Levite’s concubine leaves him, but pursuing her, the host and Levite give the concubine to the Benjamites who rape and leave her for dead. The Levite cuts her into twelve pieces, and sends her body parts to the tribes of Israel. Such violence mirrors the Jeffrey Dalmers of the world who kidnap and 9  Kari Latvus, God, Anger, and Ideology: The Anger of God in Joshua and Judges (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1998): 91; Terence E, Fretheim, “God and violence in the OT,” Word & World 24.1 (Winter 2004): 18–28. 10  Karen Jo Torjesen, When Women Were Priests: Women’s Leadership in the Early Church and the Scandal of Their Subordination in the Rise of Christianity (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1995), x–30. 11  Ibid., 53–154. 12  Lillian R. Klein, “A Spectrum of Female Characters in the Book of Judges,” in A Feminist Companion to Judges, ed. Athalya Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993), 26. L. Juliana Claassens, “Female Resistance in Spite of Injustice: Human Dignity and the Daughter of Jephthah,” in SciElo: Old Testament Essays. Online version 26/3 (2013): http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo. php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1010-99192013000300005 [accessed June 29, 2019].

146   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan kill their victims. Dalmer’s obsession escalated into cannibalism. Most interpreters either excuse characters for reproachable behavior or blame characters for their victimization.13 Violated and dismembered, the women (Jepthah’s daughter and the Levite’s concubine) serve as scapegoats. None are shown to be mothers or wives in the narratives. These texts combine themes of sex and sacrifice potentially to have a titillating effect on the (presumably) male authors and audiences of these texts, and engage attitudes toward female martyrdom and women’s bodies as objects of the male gaze.14 Violence against women, especially intimate partner violence and sexual violence, is at crisis mode globally, and a significant public health problem that violates women’s human rights. Numerous markers, from low education, a history of child maltreatment, to addictions and unequal gender norms are critical markers for birthing male abusers and female abused. Further, the impact on children who witness or experience such trauma, known as childhood adversity, can lead to adult physical ramifications (cancer, stroke, cardiac disease), altering cell replication and having psychological and emotional impact.15 Lament provides space to grieve violence and pain, from the perspective of prevention, never allowing for potential violence. Lament also provides process for dealing with envy, anger, sadness, greed, depression, insecurity so that perpetrators and those perpetrated against can get the help needed to live life to the fullest and embrace healthy relationships.

Various Voices of Lament: Psalms, Lamentations, Beyoncé Lament is sacred speech that names the deep heart ache and pain experienced on a personal, familial, communal, local, state, federal, and global level. Lament expresses our concrete, yet mysterious grief. Much of this pain and aching is nebulous, not yet answered, not yet resolved or healed. Many people live at the intersections of ancient, calcified grief. Some people know something is amiss, and have tried self-help books, alcohol, prescription drugs, extramarital affairs, youth enhancing surgery, food, retail therapy, new acquisitions or toys to seek solace and a solution to the abyss within, becoming more fragile. Human anguish, angst, and halleluiahs in concert with Israel’s stylized rage, anger, and pain get tossed and turned together as an unsatisfying goulash.16 With a world and a personal life rife with violence and exploitation, of questions that 13 Joy A. Schroeder, Dinah’s Lament: The Biblical Legacy of Sexual Violence in Christian Interpretation (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007), 149. 14  Lauren A. S. Monroe, “Disembodied Women: Sacrificial Language and the Deaths of Bat-Jephthah, Cozbi, and the Bethlehemite Concubine,” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 75 (2013): 32–34, 45–52. 15  “Violence Against Women: Key Facts”; https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/ violence-against-women, November 29, 2017 [accessed May 19, 2019]. Nadine Burke Harris, The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity (Boston, MA: Mariner Books, 2018), xiv–xv. 16  Ann Weems, Psalms of Lament (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1999), ix–x, xxi.

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   147 challenge culture and faith, amid alienation and anxiety, displacement and de­spond­ency, people need lament. Lament language, prayers and liberation—justice rituals and traditions—provide a compassionate environment where one can appeal to God and ask for help and inspiration, amid injustice and universal suffering. Humanity needs lament to encourage love, not vengeance amid twenty-first-century terrorism. Despite universal lament, people often do not hear those prayers or they neglect justice rituals and traditions. With humility and gratitude for a relationship with God, one can offer lament for divine help and guidance. With the freedom to create lament within community in mutuality, where all are welcome, shared stories reflect suffering, and acknowledge the pain that ultimately can be transformed to joy. People can experience relief when allowed the space of self-expression. Suffering is an ancient and contemporary reality. Such drama induced by political intrigue and corruption is not acceptable. With global death and tragedy, people create laments, and need more intentional work on laments, to connect with God.17 Lament as creative, honest ritual does not romanticize or wallow in pain. With fasting, prayer, deep soul-searching contemplation, space unfolds for profound awareness of pain, grief, acceptance, and space to envision how to process emotions and thoughts about the grief process. As Ecclesiastes people, there is a time to mourn (3:4b), as worship and experience of God. In the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5:3), Jesus provides space for, and authorizes lamentation as blessing. God desires humanity to worship as justice, not be ambivalent or cavalier about human suffering. Injustice calls for lament to make known brokenness, and worship with contrite hearts. Life is not fair, nor always joyous. Yet hope abounds. Lament provides a way to process and not avoid pain.18 Lament is a coping device for violence wrought through calamity, tragedy, and failure. Violence is pervasive and involves anything personal, institutional, and/or systemic that depersonalizes, damages, or destroys humanity and all of creation. All violence can lead to disrespect, distrust, and hate. Biblically, God rejects human violence to all creation (Ezek. 45:9; Hab. 2:8, 17). God wants to redeem people “from oppression and violence” (Ps. 72:14), believers cry out to God for deliverance from violence (Ps. 25:19; 74:20; 140:1, 4, 11); the righteous work to motivate God to act on their behalf by claiming they have avoided violence (Ps. 17:4). Deliverance from violence invokes songs of thanksgiving (2 Sam. 22:3, 49; Ps. 18:48). Human violence is catalyst for divine violence. Fretheim notes that it is vital to take godly anger and judgment seriously. Kari Latvus posits that the Deuteronomistic interpretation of God emerges out of intolerance, strict dogmatism, and fundamentalism, an important observation, however with an anti-Jewish Christian slant. The lament psalms, notably imprecatory laments, challenge one’s sensibilities, requesting from God the use of violence against detractors. Judgment involves divine and human factors, often including violence. Fretheim argues that divine violence, 17 Nancy C. Lee, Lyrics of Lament: From Tragedy to Transformation (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2010), ix, x, 3–16, 24, 27, 28, 56, 61. 18  Russell McLeod, “A Time to Mourn,” The Living Pulpit 11.4 (October–December 2002): 19.

148   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan within a violent world, subverts human violence to bring creation to a place where ­violence ceases to exist. Whether salvific or in judgment, divine violence occurs to bring about deliverance and redeem creation. Lament provides space to question and challenge God’s actions of violence and punishment (Psalm 44). Biblical patriarchal violence is systemic, supports glorification of war, destruction of cities, and rape of women. If divine violence is never an end in itself, but engaged to accomplish loving purposes and God does not necessarily place positive value on the use of violence (Isaiah 47), some ambiguity remains. God may respond in violent ways in and through various agents so sin and evil do not go unchecked in the world:19 a need for lament. Here Psalm 22 provides instruction, using a womanist hermeneutic.

Psalm 22 Psalm 22, a plea for deliverance from suffering and hostility, is immortalized when Jesus wails this Psalm of David from the cross, to the Creator/Abba—signifying the state of forsakenness (Matt. 27:46). This instance of horror and agony was not one of theological curiosity, but spiritual desolation, for Jesus already knew the when and the why.20 In psalms, pain ultimately becomes social, affecting one and others around about, to ever widening circles, making pain dynamic. After one knows pain, loneliness, and social rejection, framed by pathos and loss of self, one yet knows divine intimacy, towards being reintegrated to the community, offering others hope. Tempered cynicism engages various ways the psalms offer responses to pain, and requires acknowledgment of pain, getting help and taking the necessary time to move toward healing, where one engages pain into a life fully lived.21 Initially, utter destitution seeks divine engagement, but fails to hear a response. Creativity accepts that one recognizes God is holy, has been trusted by ancestors, and God faithfully delivered them, while wondering if this lament is helpful regarding horrific catastrophe, as for instance when one parent burns down the house with a partner and children dead inside. While feeling abandoned, one counters, testifying to divine faithfulness since birth. Courage creates the space that despite various catastrophes, one can believe, yet struggle to know that divine deliverance is imminent, with praises and thanksgiving, because of divine faithfulness. As a lament, Psalm 22 provides the space to grieve loss of respect within community and loss of life. Commitment sees that this dirge as permission to testify to the pain and 19  Kari Latvus, God, Anger, and Ideology: The Anger of God in Joshua and Judges (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1998): 91; Terence E. Fretheim, “God and Violence in the OT,” Word & World 24.1 (Winter 2004): 18–28. 20  John Piper, “Desiring God: “My God, My God, why Have You Forsaken Me? Didn’t Jesus Already Know?”; available online at https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/my-god-my-god-why-have-youforsaken-me-didnt-jesus-already-know [accessed May 19, 2019]. 21 Kristin M. Swenson, Living through Pain: Psalms and the Search for Wholeness (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2005), 160–67, 224–29.

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   149 celebrate recognizing and trusting a God who cares. Honoring relationship with and being with this God as daily discipline, not as happenstance and self-satisfying expression, with dis-ease and violence in human life, one relies solely on God, who hears and bears our pain with us, for deliverance, healing, and transformation.22 Candor, as catalyst allows the one abused to name her/himself as worm, mocked, under relentless attack; yet one continues to connect with God. Systemically, the underlying factors for women of color include supremacy, patriarchy, and misogyny that exists in the world. Simultaneously, the individual and particular communities need to focus on God and remember divine faithfulness. The lament names the pain and remembers the deliverance. Curiosity presses one to seek the sacred as well as justice and love continuously. Accordingly, Psalm 22 pushes to move broken humanity toward heightened openness, well-being, and capacity to engage self and neighbor in love. The comedic allows the space for growth, and respect for other modes of interpretation, despite disagreement. Ultimately, all should live for God: God lives, loves, and protects in the past, present, and for future generations. Victims and perpetrators of domestic and global terroristic violence can also know this God and such transformation. In the United States, violence incarnated and personified, are barriers to wellness and wholeness: violence—lived, in culture, and court rooms, has reached mythic proportions. Violence is systemic, often couched in polite language, ingrained by supremacist patriarchy, in subtle, frightening terms. Injustice, pain, suffering, wrong-doing, and wielding of power in the language of universal, complex violence. This dehumanizing experience prohibits one’s freedom. Violence, sometimes self-imposed and extremely subtle, as to not be considered feasible for litigation, can be heinous, so blatant that it is inconceivable one human being could exact such acts on another. Psalm 22 reflects that violence is evolutionary and seems to escalate with each generation and heightens in intensity and creativity with increased sophisticated technology in software, hardware, and drugs. Violence displaces the role of holiness, and sacrality of God and of humanity; violence skews reality and is often ambiguous. Systemic violence embodied as racism, sexism, classism, ageism, homophobia, and ableism ultimately undergird and protect structural violence, intrinsic cultural barriers to wellness and wholeness. Psalm 22, then, requires naming the cancer of domestic violence as it cyclically infests, erodes, and slowly, painfully, egregiously effects homicidal destruction, generation after generation. This lament lets those victimized recognize they do not have to be punching bags. The communal aspects of Ps. 22 indicates that with God and community, domestic violence must cease so that people can experience life fully, where scripture’s eschatological character signifies divine rule and an intent for humanity to live into divine relationality.23

22  Michael Jinkins, In the House of the Lord: Inhabiting the Psalms of Lament (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1998), 3, 18, 39, 116. 23  J. Clinton McCann, Jr., “The Book of Psalms,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary: A Commentary in Twelve Volumes (vol. IV; Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1996), 765.

150   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan In the Psalms, violent, self-righteous, paranoid utterances signal a long human debate, carried on throughout scripture about God’s relation to humanity, love and mercy, justice and retribution, wherein truth emerges through the dialectic and across the diversity of voices. Nevertheless, the church tends to turn the other way, making victims voiceless shadows, championing predators as victorious sycophants, annihilating the Gospel. The pain of lament, stands alongside other ghastly texts, and usually are balanced by texts of reconciliation and mercy. Psalm 22 does allow for the voice of horror and pain. We do not need to pretend that bad things do not happen. We do not have to invoke a stoic, puritanical resolve to pretend that all is well. Psalm 22 gives us permission to name our pain, and to seek divine and human assistance in moving toward health and wellness. Lamentations opens with the language of grief and pain.

Lamentations 1 The socio-cultural context of Lamentations 1, of Jerusalem, eerily reflects global pain and distress, particularly in war-torn countries and in detention camps; all are held captive by those in power. Under Babylonian control, Daughter Zion offers laments as to her worthlessness, thus tempered cynicism questions how Daughter Zion and her community imagine the impact of lament. She announces that God has given them over, those who once were chosen have lost divine favor. Creativity pushes for an awareness of the complexities of lament along with our universal, global condition of devastating losses from natural disaster, terrorism, bullying, and elderly abuse, much loss and grieving abounds. From the natural disasters of tsunamis, hurricanes, and earthquakes due to climate change to the horrific loss of human lives due to wars, genocide, mass shootings, terrorists’ attacks, and intimate acts of domestic violence and sexual assault cases we need lament. There is so much to mourn, grieve, and lament. Like children wrenched from their parents at the U.S./Mexico border, Lamentations 1 contains much distress, desolation, and feelings of being distraught. The suffering of the Babylonian captives, like these children and many refugees globally, is massive and brutal. Womanist hermeneutic of courage presses the analysis where readers question ancient and contemporary violence and lament in dialog. Having the space to name the cost of violence can be therapeutic if met with courageous honesty, when listening to the voices of Daughter Zion (Lam. 1:9c.11c–16.18–22) and the witness (Lam. 1:9b.10–11b–17), who speak over and next to one another, minus the voice of God.24 Commitment to in-depth hearing and just, appropriate living of texts situates this narrative of Sturm und drank, of intense pain amidst social and personal ills, where one can be lonely amidst crowds; formerly victorious and flourishing, now Daughter Zion is 24  Catherine Cavazos Renken, “Between Text and Sermon: Lamentations 1,” Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 67.2 (2013): 194–5.

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   151 distraught, bitter, without friends, at the height of distress; with no rest, and much time of mourning and servitude. Her pursuers, like patriarchal, oppressive governments, may even ridicule her with a spirit of Schadenfreude, wherein they take pleasure and amusement in her pain, humiliation, or mistakes. Candor reveals times of celebration are gone as religious leaders groan, oppression unfolds as young girls grieve, and her enemies prosper. Daughter Zion suffers at the hands of God for her many sins and transgressions. In her nakedness, a height of shame, she groans and suffers—such is the plight of many victims of domestic and sexual violence. Like her, do others subject to abuse cry out to the Lord about her/their suffering and the strategies of her/their enemies? Her confession abounds, attesting to her sorrow, while wondering about her punishment. There is no request for pity, but weeping because of her plight—the distance from God, her comforter. Within her confession she concedes to God’s righteous acts, because of her rebellion. This rebellion has caused distancing from youth, priests, and elders. Simultaneously, she asks that the enemies also be dealt with: her groans and wailing is great; she tires as her heart is faint. There seems no reprieve for the one who suffers. Curiosity engages lament to heightened openness, rooted in love that wonders what to do with innocent suffering not connected to rebellion. Thus, this is not a text of good news. Rather, this text allows for, sanctions, the space of complaint, of grieving, and of lament. Too often we seek to resolve the pain before adequately reckoning with the hurt. This text brings to mind the egregious, horrific slaughter of nine faithful souls at Mother Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Charleston, SC, during Bible Study and prayer, by Dylan Roof, a white supremacist sympathizer, June 17, 2015. Where did this man learn to hate so? The response later that evening, and at his first courtroom appearance by some of the remaining family members were arresting. While Roof remained impassive, a few family members gave words of forgiveness as they rehearsed some of their pain. How could one possibly know and be able to offer words of forgiveness when they were still in shock? No one intends to hear that their loved ones and friends were slaughtered while participating in a service at their place of worship. The comedic lens makes room for a variety of interpretations, a proc­ess of listening and learning. Lamentations 1 affirms and canonizes the space and legitimacy of angst and the need for rituals that pronounce and help process grief. Cultural artifacts often can help us.

Beyoncé and “Hold Up” from Lemonade A womanist reading sees that, like the psalms, popular culture exposes the despicable nature of domestic violence, from novels and film to poetry, art, and television. All kinds of music, from opera and country to the blues, R&B, and even hip hop decry the ghastly, revolting assault again and again upon human bodies, minds, and souls. When popular culture responds to the despicable, one can experience lament.

152   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan An American singer-songwriter, (1981– ) raised in Texas, Beyoncé performed in various singing and dancing competitions as a child. She rose to fame in the late 1990s as lead singer of the R&B girl-group Destiny’s Child, one of the best-selling girl groups in history. Their hiatus saw Beyoncé’s theatrical film debut (2002), and the release of her first solo album, Dangerously in Love (2003). The album established her as a solo artist worldwide, and earned her five Grammy Awards. Beyoncé’s Lemonade, heralded an “emotional tour de force,” by Marcus J. Moore, is raw passion, acerbic heartbreak and devastation, championing the myriad lived experiences of women in general and black women in particular. This edgy yet elegant visual, musical tapestry that combines hip-hop, electro-soul, R&B, and rock celebrates bold creativity that ­projects her passion for naming metaphors and features that signal the power of black female passion, celebrating identity that transcends stereotypical normativity. Her naked emotions that paint pictures of family, heartbreak, pain, and love tap into her artistic creativity, as interlocutor of the real and the fantastic, affording the listener hermeneutic license:25 We [Black women] live in a world that hates us. There is no way around that. While being Black is beautiful, being Black is also dangerous, and many of us do not survive. . . . [Beyoncé] created a moment full of safety and affirmation to remind us that when this world does its best to defeat us and make us doubt the greatness of who we are, we know the truth.26

In addition to black women on screen, Beyoncé pays homage to and works with six black women: poetically Somali-British poet Warsan Shire; vocals of pianist, singer, activist Nina Simone; vulnerability of black woman’s identity resonant with novelist Toni Morrison; African artistry and dance embodied in an iconic African queens— Nefertiti; imagery reflecting African diasporic spiritual practices immortalized through anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston’s work; and nods to her sister Solange, showing black women posing in parallel formation to Solange’s 2014 wedding photo.27 The aesthetic context of this lament visually empowers black women, commemorates Southern culture, and engages the Black Lives Matter movement, Malcolm X, and Hurricane Katrina. Beyoncé represents a scorned demographic, that of neglected black women. Lemonade, divided into eleven chapters with title cards describing Beyoncé’s reactions to her husband’s alleged infidelity, channeling Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grief that Ross disavowed toward the end of her life reflects tempered cynicism, engaging query about pain, rooted in faith, ultimately toward healing. The captions include: 25  https://www.vox.com/2016/4/28/11518702/lemonade-beyonce-explained [accessed May 18, 2019]. 26  Candace Benbow, Op. Ed.: “Beyonce Comes Home to Remind Us That Her Greatness Resides in Us Too,” Essence (April 17, 2019): https://www.essence.com/feature/beyonces-homecoming-review/ [accessed June 29, 2019]. 27  Victoria M. Massie, “6 Black Women Beyoncé Channels in Lemonade—From Warsan Shire to Zora Neale Hurston”; available online at https://www.vox.com/2016/4/26/11501466/beyonce-lemonadewarsan-shire [accessed May 18, 2019].

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   153 “Intuition,” “Denial,” “Anger,” “Apathy,” “Emptiness,” “Accountability,” “Reformation,” “Forgiveness,” “Resurrection,” “Hope,” and “Redemption,” engaging womanist creativity that invites adventurous interpretations as Beyoncé connects the emotional and philosophical with the spiritual. Outside of silent cinema, German playwright Bertolt Brecht invented using intertitles to prevent one from getting lost in the illusion of fiction, participating with the content intellectually, a technique Beyoncé employs to make the personal the political. Knowles takes on various identities and includes black women celebrities and unknown black women, with a poignant engagement of mothers of dead, young black men, murdered by police—state-sanctioned violence, as she codifies themes of disturbance and grief, with eerie images from different times and places: using courage to create dialog between violence and lament. Throughout the video, images of water—which she conquers—depicts baptism, death, and resurrection. Red carpet and/ or blood sense, conjure menstruation and orgasm.28 Lemonade is lament writ large, notably the song “Hold On,”29 which begins with Beyoncé reciting her poem, “Denial.”30 Using religious language of abstinence, fasting, and self-flagellation, connecting her menses to scripture, she questions her lover’s fidelity. “Denial” set in watery, embryonic fluids, serves as prelude to the lament: “Hold Up,” where Beyoncé emerges through a door, signifying the fertility goddess Oshun in golden garb, and moves through the streets, with a bat smashing car windows. Commitment signifies appropriate living and the power of lament, affording significant discovery. Selasi Bowen posits that whereas feminist scholar bell hooks views the smashing of vehicles as valorizing violence and anger, and over-sexualizing of women as Beyoncé depicts the fantasy, Bowen suggests that Beyoncé’s agency affords her the privacy of knowing her anger and betrayal for what is unfathomable violence. While dealing with infidelity and her own awareness and growth, she deals with pain and moves toward healing and reckons with being human.31 She exemplifies that candor activates to exegete systemic violence, and processes pain through lament. Curiosity reflects Beyoncé’s use of various themes and personal experiences to honor the pain and move broken humanity towards heightened openness and love. The comedic creates the space for empathy, and finding more value in humanity, and lament as gift of process and awareness. This creative, visceral, embodied lament as ritual and process is lament at its best: a safe space for naming pain, living through grief, without apology with the possibility of not being victim. When we name our reality and thus access personal power, we have the ability to heal.

28  Freja Dam, “Beyoncé’s ‘Lemonade’: A Visual Tale of Grief, Resurrection, and Black Female Empowerment”; available at https://www.spin.com/2016/04/beyonce-lemonade-hbo-album-filmanalysis/ [accessed May 18, 2019]. 29  “Hold Up”; available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeonBmeFR8o [accessed May 18, 2019]. 30  https://genius.com/Beyonce-denial-poem-lyrics [accessed May 18, 2019]. 31  “A Critical Analysis of Beyoncé’s Lemonade: Hold Up, Let’s Talk about Violence”; http://courses. suzannechurchill.com/community-s17/2017/03/21/a-critical-analysis-of-beyonces-lemonade-hold-up-letstalk-about-violence/ [accessed May 18, 2019].

154   Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan

Lament: An Option to Quieten Fear, Enhance Love, Effect Healing To engage lament as ritual is to move toward a process of healing that shows our complex pain is also God’s pain, our sorrows, part of God’s sorrows. Ritual as symbolic, patterned activity can engage us as individuals and communities, where we interpret things differently, and ultimately move to restoration of spiritual vitality, bodily well-being, emotional wholeness, mental functioning. When the suffering is particularly horrific and egregious, we need a song, psalm, a lament to give voice to the trauma. Public rituals testify and bear witness to loss, pain, and death which moves us to engage grief, creating a safe space to face memories we would rather forget, empowered to hold the memories with God, in grace, and then letting them go. Rituals help people heal, as they experience intense emotions in honesty, and provide a space for experiencing consolation, as they engage lament language to make present deep wounds of pain and loss, amidst communities where they can know divine restoration and creation’s redemption. Such experiences help us connect emotions, memories, words, and images between divine stories and theirs; they know our own vulnerability and finite selves, buffered by God. Rituals help people heal, as they experience intense and God’s hiddenness with honesty, without fear. Ritual honesty supports healing. Authentic rituals provide the occasion, the language, and the gestures for us to encounter realities and truth that, most of us would choose to avoid, moving us to know honest grief, a grief that heals. A womanist analysis that critiques all systemic oppressions allow for creative, in-depth analysis of the need for and the impact of lament. Rituals of lament create space to hold hope and pain in all its complexities in tension, believing that this is not the end of the story. The eschatological space of lament makes opportunities to put in song and story the deep pain and grief, giving it voice,32 invoking patterned activity with symbolic meaning. The resulting awareness of the pain, acceptance of what is, and empowered action to face the pain honors and validates the need for, and place of ancient and contemporary lament.

Bibliography Brueggemann, Walter. Reality, Grief, Hope: Three Prophetic Tasks. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014. Byron, Gay, and Vanessa Lovelace, eds. Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse. Semeia Studies. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016. Garrett, Greg. Stories from the Edge: A Theology of Grief. Louisville, KY: Westminster, John Knox, 2008. Jinkins, Michael. In the House of the Lord: Inhabiting the Psalms of Lament. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1998. 32  Herbert Anderson, “How Rituals Heal,” Word & World Volume 30.1 (Winter 2010): 43–9.

Lament as Womanist Healing in Times of Global Violence   155 Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl. Baptized Rage, Transformed Grief: I Got Through, So Can You. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2017. Nouwen, Henri. Turn My Mourning into Dancing: Finding Hope in Hard Times. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2001. Pember, Mary Annette. “We Must Address a Terrible Truth about Toxic Masculinity.” https:// truthout.org/articles/we-must-address-a-terrible-truth-about-tox [accessed June 8, 2019]. Smith, Mitzi, ed. I Found God In Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2016. Solomon, Akiba, and Kenrya Rankin, eds. How We Fight White Supremacy: A Field Guide to Black Resistance. New York, NY: Bold Type Books, 2019. Soong-Chan, Rah. Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times. Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2015.

Pa rt I I

T H E I M PAC T OF N E OL I BE R A L ISM ON F E M I N IST BI BL IC A L I N T E R PR ETAT ION

chapter 11

N eoliber a l Femi n ist Schol a rship i n Biblica l St u die s Esther Fuchs

This essay makes visible basic assumptions that contemporary feminist biblical scholars take for granted in their scholarship. As these unexamined assumptions have become the foundation of the current consensus on how “to do” feminist criticism in biblical studies, they are rarely discussed or problematized. They are also not recognized as an obstacle for a more radical feminist interrogation of what has emerged as a new academic field in biblical studies and as a barrier for transforming biblical studies as a whole. Yet, the interrogation and transformation of traditional methods of inquiry in the academy have long been seen as the most urgent priorities of feminist scholarship. Already in the early 1980s, Adrienne Rich identified “disobedience” as the core mission of women’s studies while Audre Lorde cautioned that “the master’s tools will never ­dismantle the master’s house.”1 In biblical studies, however, the goal is to legitimize feminism as a viable and reliable scholarly project, and the strategy is to demonstrate that women are well versed in dominant methodological practices and that they can “do” biblical criticism as well as their male counterparts. Feminist Bible scholars thus show that women are just as important a topic of inquiry as men, and highlight biblical women’s religious, historical, or literary significance, depending on the researcher’s specialization. To the extent that the emerging field has followed the dictates of the liberal market economy according to which traditional academic benchmarks measure competition, productivity (relentless publishing), and success, and to the extent that the emerging field has sought inclusion, approbation, 1  Adrienne Rich, “Disobedience and Women’s Studies,” chap. in Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose 1979–1985 (New York, NY / London: W.W. Norton and Company, 1986), 76–84; Audre Lorde: “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House,” chap. in Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1984), 110–13.

160   Esther Fuchs and accommodation within the confines of an already existing broader field, feminist biblical studies has followed a neoliberal rather than transformative trajectory. This essay proceeds in six sections. The introductory section illustrates the neoliberal framing of feminist work in biblical studies. My main argument is that this framing sought to add women, inserting them into various sub-disciplines of biblical studies, as normalized objects of inquiry, thereby minimizing or denying the effects of patriarchy. The introduction offers a historical outline of women’s studies, which by contrast focused on patriarchy, deepening, extending, elaborating, and revising its meanings and implication as the field moved from a liberal frame of reference to a critical and transformational interrogation of disciplinary knowledge in the humanities and social sciences. The introductory section draws a contrast between the neoliberal emphasis on methodology, interpretation, and validation of conventional scholarly practices, and the emphasis in women’s studies (or feminist studies) on theory, critique, and the questioning of received scholarly practices. The body of the essay substantiates my critique by focusing on five specific strategies for normalizing biblical women as subjects of scholarly interest. They include depatriarchalizing, historicizing, textualizing, mythologizing, and idealizing strategies. In each section I juxtapose the biblical studies approach to a women’s studies approach within the same discipline. For example, in theology I contrast Phyllis Trible with Gerda Lerner. Alternatively, in history I contrast Carol Meyers with Mary Daly. In the final, seventh, section I call for a move away from the current hegemonic neoliberal framing of feminist biblical studies to a critical, transformational theory and practice, in which the “feminist” emphasis is equal to the “biblical.”

Disconnected from Women’s Studies: The Neoliberal Turn in Feminist Biblical Studies The spate of publications, beginning in the early 1990s and continuing unabated to this day, respond to the academic, religious, and disciplinary market demand for new work on women and the Bible.2 Often these studies neither address nor engage each other; for 2 Savina J. Teubal, Sarah the Priestess: The First Matriarch of Genesis (Athens, OH: Swallow Press, 1985); Ancient Sisterhood: The Lost Traditions of Hagar and Sarah (Athens, OH: Swallow Press, 1990); Sharon Pace Jeansonne, The Women of Genesis: From Sarah to Potiphar’s Wife (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1990); Alicia S. Ostriker, Feminist Revision and the Bible (Oxford / Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1993); Leila Leah Bronner, From Eve to Esther: Rabbinic Reconstructions of Biblical Women (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1994); Renita J. Weems, Battered Love: Marriage, Sex and Violence in the Hebrew Prophets (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995); Danna Nolan Fewell and David M. Gunn, Gender, Power and Promise: The Subject of the Bible’s First Story (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1993); J. Cheryl Exum, Fragmented Women: Feminist (Sub)versions of Biblical Narratives (Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press 1993); Yvonne Sherwood, The Prostitute and the Prophet: Hosea’s Marriage in Literary-Theoretical Perspective (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996); Alice

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   161 the most part they ignore each other. Each work is motivated by the desire to interpret the biblical text “properly,” that is in accordance with disciplinary prescriptive principles and evaluative standards. The earliest publications attempt to legitimize the focus on biblical women as a scholarly pursuit. Currently, however, publications are becoming more disconnected due to emerging subfields that are increasingly fragmented, divided by disciplinary loyalties, methodological assumptions, identity politics, or “social location.” They are also disconnected through discursive practices, such as the use of modernist versus postmodern language. Reinventing the wheel all over again in each subfield generates a seriality of reproductions, repetitions, and elaborations of knowledge, in accordance with biblical studies conventions, and on the other hand, a cacophony of discordant discourses.3 Reference works from introductions to commentaries, from companions to dictionaries, apply to biblical women the same procedures that were previously applied to men. But while the content differs from previous traditional publications, the frame of reference that defines them does not. The serial enumeration of biblical books appears in every reference work, the required critical apparatus of traditional authoritative journals is usually included testifying to the work’s bona fide credentials and obedience to traditional rules of scholarly conduct. These formal elements endorse the status quo and the norms of the field of biblical studies. This interpretive move, in turn frames the feminist practice as a sub-genre, a subfield, and a modality within the larger context. While this policy was adequate for the earlier stage when feminist scholars made their first inroads into biblical studies, it is no longer sufficient. What is required now is a reconsideration of theoretical priorities and of the relationship with the broader frame of Bach, Women, Seduction and Betrayal (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Nehama Aschkenasy, Biblical Tales of Oppression and Escape (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University State, 1998); Ilona N. Rashkow, Taboo or Not Taboo: Sexuality and Family in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2000); Claudia V. Camp, Wise Strange and Holy: The Strange Woman and the Making of the Bible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000); Alice A. Keefe, Woman’s Body and the Social Body in Hosea (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001); Helena Zlotnick, Dinah’s Daughters: Gender and Judaism from the Hebrew Bible to Late Antiquity (Philadelphia, PA: Penn State University Press, 2002); Gale A. Yee, Poor Banished Children of Eve: Woman as Evil in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003); Lillian R. Klein, Deborah to Esther: Sexual Politics in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2003); Tammi J. Schneider, Sarah: Mother of Nations (New York, NY: Continuum, 2004); Athalya Brenner, Biblical Women Tell Their Own Stories (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2005); Tikva Frymer-Kensky, Reading the Women of the Bible (New York, NY: Schocken Books, 2002); Studies in Bible and Feminist Criticism (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2006); Susanne Scholz, Sacred Witness: Rape in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2010). 3  Carol A. Newsom and Sharon H. Ringe, eds., The Women’s Bible Commentary (Louisville, KY: The Westminster / John Knox Press, 1992; second ed., 1997; third rev. ed.; 2012); Athalya Brenner, ed., A Feminist Companion to the Bible (2 series; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993; 1998); Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed., Searching the Scriptures: A Feminist Introduction and Commentary (2 Vols.) (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1993–94); Carol Meyers, Toni Craven and Ross S. Kraemer, eds., Women in Scripture: A Dictionary of Named and Unnamed Women in the Hebrew Bible, the Apocryphal / Deuterocanonical Books and the New Testament (Boston, MA / New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000); Tamara Cohn Eskenazi and Andrea L. Weiss, eds., The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (New York, NY: URJ Press, 2008).

162   Esther Fuchs reference. I posit that feminist biblical studies, defined as a hybridized area of scholarship, not look only to biblical studies for its basic terms of reference and scholarly goals, but also to the broader field of women’s studies for theoretical and practical context. Feminist practices in biblical studies suggest an interpretive and descriptive rather than an analytic interest. The inclusion of women as subjects of interest did not create a re-vision or even interrogation of foundational assumptions in the field. For the most part, the growing number of publications created yet another subfield in an already variegated field of fields. Even within the new discourses that entered biblical studies, including postmodernism, feminism figures as a modality, a variation, and a subcategory. This fragmentation is also the case with other scholarly discourses, including postcolonial, queer, transnational, and cultural studies. Biblical studies added feminism and continues to stir. Thus, the field continues to expand, diversify, and compete with other scholarly projects in the humanities. The difference between various feminist publications has neither been articulated theoretically, nor has this growing body of knowledge been consistently evaluated. In a growing number of ever more sizable anthologies, disparate essays are placed next to each other without any explanation for what may connect them, or what general vision, agenda, or position is supposed to guide the anthology as a whole. As interpretations began to vary and multiply, and distinct perspectives began to emerge, the question of method eclipsed the more fundamental questions about shared goals, trajectories, and the politics of working within the limits of a non-feminist academic context. Feminist scholars continue to seek the approbation of the gate keepers by defining women, the new subject of inquiry within the confining methodological framework of their specializations. While scholars testify to the innovation of their methodological practices, they highlight the unique effectiveness or superiority of their respective disciplinary contexts. The competitive relationship between distinct subfields often occluded any dialogical transactions or any attempt at creating a shared agenda, common priorities, or a feminist politics of knowledge production. In neoliberal terms, feminist research in biblical studies creates new products for the company. It expands the consumer base and the volume of production. It also revalidates its agenda and methods of inquiry even as, in theory, feminism claims to be revolutionary and transformative.4 As is often the case in the late capitalistic marketplace, innovation means variation rather than difference, offering the freedom to choose between equally enticing products. Though it engages the surface exclusions of women from biblical texts and from traditional scholarship, neoliberal feminism validates and reproduces normative practices and evaluative standards. It does not question or interrogate the procedures that are supposed to produce knowledge about biblical women or women in ancient Israel. Neoliberal feminism seeks to be included, accepted, and 4  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Bread Not Stone: The Challenge of Feminist Biblical Interpretation (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1984); But She Said: Feminist Practices of Biblical Interpretation (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1992); Sharing Her Word: Feminist Biblical Interpretation in Context (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1998).

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   163 legitimized by the purveyors of the field. It primarily serves the professional interests of a small elite of scholars, competing for a dwindling number of stable academic jobs in institutions of higher learning or in religiously affiliated institutions upholding the dominant religion of the Euro-American continent. Neoliberal feminism is focused on the opportunity to compete in the academic marketplace, not on changing it. The inclusion of women as subjects and objects of research does not threaten the interests of biblical studies. On the contrary, it bolsters its bid for academic respectability in the competitive knowledge industry of the humanities and social sciences. The dominant feminist position in the formative 1980s was liberationist, synthesizing a theology of liberation and a feminist liberal agenda of equal opportunity and inclusion. Patriarchy as a systemic problem was outlined as the primary concern of a specific perspective rather than a point of contention that demanded serious debate and reflection.5 In the 1990s, feminism was defined as a method, an approach, and a reading strategy. Rather than clarifying its political investments, feminist scholars attempted to deny their political interests and highlighted the invented diversity of feminist approaches.6 This neoliberal presentation framed difference in feminism as diversity, plurality, and heterogeneity, and as a desirable commodity for potential consumers who sought in the academe what they found in the late capitalist marketplace: a rich selection of enticing products competing for readers and students. In the first decades of the new millennium, racial, ethnic, national identities were understood as a diversification that enabled further specialization and greater fragmentation in the field. The strategy of “add women and stir” which dominated the formative liberal phase, was expanded to “add different women and stir.” Feminism was included as a subcategory in biblical postcolonial studies, and “social location” has become a new legitimate category of professional expertise.7 The entire mapping of this emerging subfield followed the dominant cartography of biblical studies pursuing new and different interpretive trajectories and approaches to biblical history and literature. Thus, feminism in biblical studies has become professionalized, disciplined, and institutionalized. In contrast, women’s studies did not seek legitimacy or approbation from the gate keepers and overseers of existing disciplines, as it constituted itself as an autonomous 5  Letty M. Russell, ed., Feminist Interpretation of the Bible (Philadelphia, PA: The Westminster Press, 1985); Adela Yarbro Collins, ed., Feminist Perspectives on Biblical Scholarship (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1985); Alice L. Laffey, An Introduction to the Old Testament: A Feminist Perspective (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1988). 6  Peggy L. Day, ed., Gender and Difference in Ancient Israel (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1989); Gayle A. Yee, ed., Judges and Method: New Approaches in Biblical Studies (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995; 2007); Athalya Brenner and Carole Fontaine, eds., A Feminist Companion to Reading the Bible: Approaches, Methods and Strategies (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997); Alice Bach, ed., Women in the Hebrew Bible (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1999). 7 Musa W. Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of the Bible (St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2000); Engaging the Bible, ed. Choi Hee An and Katheryn Pfisterer Darr (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2006); Engaging the Bible in a Gendered World, ed. Linda Day and Carolyn Pressler (Louisville, KY / London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006); Judith E. McKinlay, Reframing Her: Biblical Women in Postcolonial Focus (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2004; 2006).

164   Esther Fuchs field of studies. It was intended to question received truths about women in the humanities and social sciences and to expose underlying patriarchal assumptions. The field of women’s studies is not content with promoting scholarship by women in higher education or to provide new information about women. Rather, it interrogates and problematizes traditional disciplinary discourses and methods of research. Women’s studies scholars thus aim to disobey authoritative discourses and scholars and to point to the quiet collusion between conventional scholarly assumptions and the social oppression of women in culture and society. As the academic arm of the women’s movement, the field of women’s studies has been openly committed to transformational and even revolutionary social visions. It seeks to expose the implicit patriarchal agenda of scholarly discourses and its objective, disinterested, and neutral posture. It is suspicious of authoritative frames and the very concept of method. Thus, it searches for common ground, for an interdisciplinary meeting ground, and for a shared theoretical and political discourse. Encouraging feminist researchers to focus on their own political positions and agendas, feminist theory promotes debate and contestation. It is the product of numerous generations and genealogies of knowledge. Difference in women’s studies is not a matter of predetermined social location but of political oppression and the personal position articulated is valued for its political meaning.8 Women’s studies promotes dialogue, debate, and solidarity between different positions, and so the field’s norms of evaluation are based on feminist scholars creating connections, bridges, and shared concerns. Women’s studies value critical analysis over interpretation, theory over method, and interdisciplinary research over specialization. The theories promoted by women’s studies scholars are political but not doctrinal. Interpretation, method, and disciplinary paradigms have been problematized in women’s studies because they create divisions, boundaries, and professional territoriality. Keen awareness of the constant forward movement in feminist thought replaces them building on foundations and continuing to question them.9

8  Alice Jardine and Hester Eisenstein, eds, The Future of Difference (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1985). 9  Ellen Carol Dubois, Gail Paradise Kelly, Elizabeth L. Kennedy, Carolyn W. Korsmeyer, and Lillian S. Robinson, eds., Feminist Scholarship: Kindling in the Groves of Academe (Urbana and Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1985); Sandra Kemp and Judith Squires, eds., Feminisms (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1997); Devoney Looser and E. Ann Kaplan, eds., Generations: Academic Feminists in Dialogue (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1997); Linda Nicholson, ed., The Second Wave: A Reader in Feminist Theory (New York, NY: Routledge, 1997); Susan S. Friedman, Mappings: Feminism and the Cultural Geographies of Encounter (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998); Ellen Messer Davidow, Disciplining Feminism: From Social Activism to Academic Discourse (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002); Marilyn Boxer, When Women Ask the Questions (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001); Robyn Wiegman, ed., Women’s Studies on Its Own (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2003); Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan, An Introduction to Women’s Studies: Gender in a Transnational World (New York, NY: McGraw Hill, 2002); Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy and Agatha Beins, eds., Women’s Studies for the Future: Foundations, Interrogations, Politics (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005); Joan W. Scott, ed., Women’s Studies on the Edge (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2008); Bonnie G. Smith, Women’s Studies: The Basics (New York, NY: Routledge, 2013).

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   165 As an interdisciplinary field, women’s studies seeks to shift feminist inquiry from ­ isciplinary methodology to critical theory.10 Critical concerns, sites, and locations do d not displace the political but expand the purview of women’s studies, intersecting and evaluating them for critical effectiveness and relevance to feminist interests.11 Feminist theory is the context for interrogating, debating, and contesting the priorities and positions of women’s studies and the politics of the women’s movement.12 The categories of race, class, gender, and the body are additional and complementary aspects of sexual difference.13 Postcolonial and transnational perspectives have more recently been introduced as interrogations of Western, globalizing, and imperial assumptions of middleand upper-class feminist academic elitism.14 Feminist theories of the body expose the patriarchal rationalization of economic exploitations of female sexuality and the violence directed at the female body as the object of rape and sexual harassment.15 Feminist theory in women’s studies is an ongoing collective debate about the field’s political priorities. It is consistently guided by a desire for greater inclusivity and effective dialogue between and among differences. It is an ongoing clarification of the most urgent problems confronting women globally and cross culturally. The analysis of oppressive economic, political, cultural, and academic regimes is central to its mission. Biblical studies is primarily concerned with method, with the question of how rather than why. Indeed, there is a general flight from patriarchy as a concept, which in turn occludes any comprehensive critical analysis of any problem at all. In general, feminism is limited to its earliest liberal definition as a quest for equal opportunity and inclusion within the existing social system, first articulated in the 1960s.16 Liberal feminism argues 10  Teresa de Lauretis, ed., Feminist Studies / Critical Studies (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1986); Elizabeth Weed, ed., Coming To Terms: Feminism, Theory, Politics (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1989). [The original title capitalizes all three words!?] 11  Chris Weedon, Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory (Oxford / Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1987; 1991); Linda J. Nicholson, ed., Feminism / Postmodernism (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1990); Judith Butler and Joan W. Scott, eds., Feminists Theorize the Political (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1992). 12  Linda Nicholson, ed., Feminist Contentions: A Philosophical Exchange (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1995); Linda Nicholson, ed., The Second Wave: A Reader in Feminist Theory (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1997). 13  Chris Weedon, Feminism, Theory and the Politics of Difference (Malden, MA / Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1999). 14  Inderpal Grewal, Transnational America: Feminisms, Diasporas, Neoliberalisms (Durham, NC / London,: Duke University Press, 2005); Chandra T. Mohanty, Feminism without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity (Durham, NC / London: Duke University Press, 2006); Caren Kaplan, Norma Alarcon, and Minoo Moallem, eds., Between Woman and Nation: Nationalisms, Transnational Feminisms, and the State (Durham, NC / London: Duke University Press, 1999). 15  Elizabeth Grosz, Volatile Bodies: Toward a Corporate Feminism (Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1994); Susan Bordo, Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1993; 2003); Katie Conboy, Nadia Medina, and Sarah Stanbury, eds., Writing on the Body: Female Embodiment and Feminist Theory (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1997); Janet Price and Margrit Shildrick, eds., Feminist Theory and the Body: A Reader (New York, NY: Routledge, 1999). 16  Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex: The Classic Manifesto of the Liberated Woman, trans. and ed. H. M. Parshley (New York, NY: Random House, 1952); Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (New York, NY: Dell Publishing, 1963).

166   Esther Fuchs not for social transformation, but for accommodation within the economic, social, and cultural status quo. The demand for equality means equal opportunity to compete for resources and compensation in the capitalist marketplace. Radical feminists, rejecting liberal reformist and corrective strategies, articulated the concept of patriarchy as a fundamental and systemic problem in the early 1980s. They maintained that the problem is systemic and anchored in a patriarchal culture, social hierarchy, power, and sexual politics.17 This analysis refined the concept of patriarchal ideology and expanded it to expose how it frames the state, law, religion, society, the family, sexuality, culture, science, and scholarship.18 In the 1980s, the liberal quest for equal rights in the workplace and the opportunity to join the elite professional class was subjected to a materialist analysis of white privilege.19 A growing number of critiques explained that the interests of liberal feminism did not address those of white workingclass and women of color. In the 1990s, feminism was interrogated for its heteronormative definition of women and gender. It was forced to thoroughly re-examine its terms of reference, including the essentialist term “women.” As a result, gender was redefined as a spectrum of differences, and so sexuality has become yet another primary category of analysis next to gender, race, and class.20 In the first decade of the new millennium, postcolonial and transnational theories forced a recognition of additional intersections of patriarchy with globalizing economies and imperial oppression.21 Patriarchy was not confined to one particular site but became the name of intersecting oppressions, including the degradation of the female body and the environment. Patriarchy remains a central concern, although its scope and meaning became extended and differentiated. Yet, while women’s studies integrated race, class, gender, and sexuality, feminist biblical studies marks off the categories as areas of distinct professional specialization. This, in turn, validates normative representations of feminist women as straight, white, educated, and professionally trained.22 Although postmodern feminism, emerging in the 1990s, 17  Mary Daly, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women’s Liberation (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1973); Kate Millett, Sexual Politics (New York, NY: Ballantine, 1970); Adrienne Rich, Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution (New York, NY: Bantam, 1976). 18  Feminist Theory: A Critique of Ideology, ed. Nannerl O. Keohane, Michelle Z. Rosaldo, and Barbara C. Gelpi (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 1982); Catharine A. MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified: Discourses on Life and Law (Cambridge, MA / London: Harvard University Press, 1987); Andrea Dworkin, Sexual Intercourse (New York, NY: The Free Press, 1987). 19  bell hooks, Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1984; 2000); This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color, ed. Cherrie Moraga and Gloria Anzaldua (New York, NY: Kitchen Table, 1983); Elizabeth V. Spelman, Inessential Woman: Problems of Exclusion in Feminist Thought (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1988). 20  Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1990); Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Epistemology of the Closet (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2008). 21  Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, In Other Worlds: Essays in Cultural Politics (New York, NY / London, 1987); Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (New York, NY / London: Routledge, 1995). 22  Bible and Culture Collective, eds., “Feminist and Womanist Criticism,” in The Postmodern Bible (New Haven, CT / London: Yale University Press, 1995), 225–71.

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   167 seemed to challenge foundational approaches framing the field, it further authorized the neoliberal definition of feminism as a rarefied, elitist, and sophisticated activity standing in opposition to the religiously and ideologically committed feminisms of the 1980s. In biblical studies, the concept of patriarchy has been understood as a term of opprobrium that is either contested or ignored. Rarely is it used as an explanatory frame to interpret women’s lack of agency, their invisibility, or their silence as symptoms of an exploitive regime. As we shall see in the next five sections, the rejection of patriarchy requires defensive, apologetic, and idealizing reconstructions of women. Rather than explaining the disparity of women in the biblical world, scholars tend to deny this disparity, arguing instead that women were as central, active, and significant as men. While the starting point for feminist inquiry in women’s studies is patriarchy and intersecting oppressions, the starting point in biblical studies is the Bible and the history of its interpretation by women. The task of feminist inquiry in biblical studies is defined a priori as an interpretation of biblical texts, traditions, and teachings. As little debate has taken place among contemporary practitioners, we can hardly refer to a theory in this subfield. Although the word “theory” has indeed been employed in feminist biblical studies, theory refers to interpretive options, the mapping of reading methods, and the evaluation of the theoretical studies produced. Instead, method itself is of primary concern; in biblical studies it is given the priority in reading biblical texts. As little or no interrogation of the theoretical foundations in feminist biblical scholarship has taken place, a “retrospective” or a descriptive consideration of past feminist exegetical work is the closest we have in terms of a historical assessment of the field.23 In those studies, pioneering scholars speak about their work individually. We read how the pioneering generation struggled with various scholarly and institutional obstacles before they became full members within a community of professional Bible scholars. In short, existing historical accounts are based on the neoliberal model that assesses the trajectories of individual professional careers within specific institutional locations and religious contexts.24 Thus, a theoretically analyzed history of the field does not currently exist. The following sections analyze, theorize, and politicize five paradigmatic interpretive strategies in feminist biblical scholarship. The aim is both to map the field and to provide a critical analysis of these strategies according to a chronological timeline. Although feminist biblical scholars rarely provide explicit theoretical explanations for their interpretations my analysis teases out their theoretical assumptions. Each of the works selected for consideration is also placed within the broader field of women’s studies and feminist theory. Importantly, the following analytical sketch is neither generational nor genealogical. Instead, most scholars begin ab novo, while a few emulate their predecessors.

23  Susanne Scholz, ed., Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect (3 Vols.; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2013–16). 24  Susanne Scholz, Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; New York, NY / London: T&T Clark Bloomsbury, 2017).

168   Esther Fuchs I selected feminist biblical scholarship that made the broadest possible statements about biblical women in general. Few of these works outline a coherent theory and even fewer acknowledge each other. Their primary concern is methodological: to demonstrate the superior effectiveness of one’s disciplinary approach to others within biblical studies. As for the subsequent generation of the 1990s and the first decades of this century, some of the studies emulate a particular model while others ignore all feminist models by reverting to the status quo ante in biblical studies, namely the descriptive or objective approach to women. I consider publications that explicitly draw on and validate pre-feminist scholarship as neo-conservative. Most of the examined books are best defined as neoliberal because they present their interpretive methods as innovative and even transformative even though these works implicitly valorize methodologies specific to their disciplinary areas or traditional norms of evaluation in biblical studies in general. Despite the considerable political difference between neoconservatism and ­neoliberalism, the selected feminist works assume that it is possible to discuss biblical women without patriarchy. In other words, they define biblical women within the disciplinary terms of biblical studies rather than of feminist studies. Despite the selected discursive differences between the modernist and postmodernist works, all of them share the neoliberal assumption that biblical women can be analyzed without reference to the patriarchal restrictions influencing their historical materiality and the ideology that shaped their textual representation. I also posit that this assumption was dominant in biblical studies before the appearance of feminism. When feminist Bible scholars accepted it, the ongoing validation erased the most significant intervention, challenge, and re-vision they had the potential to introduce to the field. By cutting off biblical women as a subject of inquiry from the feminist concept of patriarchy, they presented biblical women as having a unique status. They isolated feminist biblical studies both from non-biblical historical context and from non-biblical literary contexts similar to their phallocentric colleagues. They assumed that biblical studies is different from other academic fields, a problematic view in higher education broadly shared and rarely challenged.

Phyllis Trible’s Depatriarchalizing Strategy Phyllis Trible is the most explicit in her rejection of patriarchy as a structuring principle of biblical theology. She is also one of the few who defends theoretically this rejection by advocating an interpretive strategy she presents as “depatriarchalizing.” A particularly popular neoliberal reading strategy attempts to depatriarchalize biblical texts and to discern recovered feminist biblical meaning. Numerous publications that continue to proliferate to this day frame Trible’s work as both pioneering and foundational. Trible’s first publication, appearing in the early 1970s, is usually placed at the top of biblical feminist reading lists and serves as the starting point for contemporary

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   169 feminist biblical exegesis.25 Many regard Trible as a pioneer because the male dominant scholarly elite of the time promoted her work as crucial to the survival, credibility, and success of Christian biblical theology and biblical studies in general. That her book serves the interests of “our common professional task” and “the dominant intellectual tradition of the West” is made clear in the foreword to the book.26 A more accurate ­presentation places Trible’s first publication in response to Mary Daly’s second publication, Beyond God the Father.27 It preceded Trible’s work chronologically and challenged on feminist grounds the “professional task” of reclaiming the academic validity of Christian theology and the intellectual authority of Western traditions.28 Daly observes that Christianity in particular and Western monotheisms in general serve as the religious rationalization, justification, and valorization of patriarchal domination.29 She presents feminism as a disobedient, revolutionary new theory of knowledge, a new discourse, and, possibly, a new theology.30 Yet Trible proposes the opposite when she recommends the utility of feminism as a biblical interpretive method: “Using feminist hermeneutics, I have tried to recover old treasures and discover new ones in the household of faith.”31 Feminist hermeneutics is recommended for its use and effectiveness as a means to an end. In other words, it fosters the return to already dominant scholarly and intellectual traditions. Trible recommends feminist hermeneutics as a way back into the system that Daly rejects as fundamentally inimical to the interests of women.32 While Daly rejects the concept of method, Trible highlights feminism’s methodological utility.33 Daly set out to liberate herself and feminist Bible scholars, whereas Trible is professionally programed, socialized, and indoctrinated by her religious, cultural, and ideological tradition. Thus, Trible’s interpretive method relies on traditional masculinist preoccupations with literature, tradition, and texts as if those were extrinsic to her own consciousness. The assumption that feminists are by definition already liberated from patriarchy underlies this neoliberal frame of reference that is rejected by radical feminists. Trible’s work reiterates, reproduces, and validates the traditional masculinist method of interpretation, framing feminist interpretation as a new modality or variation on an already existing principle. She explains: “In whatever ways it develops, the liberation of scripture marks interpretation old and new. By using the principle, feminists stand within a long history; by applying it to the idolatrous patriarchy, they introduce a radically new subject. From this history they draw comfort, caution, and courage.”34 Trible separates herself as interpreter from “idolatrous patriarchy” not only as a feminist who has 25  Phyllis Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1987). 26 Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality, xi. 27  Mary Daly, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women’s Liberation (Boston, MA: Beacon, 1973). 28  Mary Daly, The Church and the Second Sex (New York, NY: Harper and Row, 1968); Beyond God the Father. 29 Daly, Beyond God the Father, 13–43. 30  Ibid., 132–78. 31 Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality, xvi. 32 Daly, Beyond God the Father, 7–11. 33  Ibid., 69–97. 34  Phyllis Trible, “Postscript: Jottings on the Journey,” 148.

170   Esther Fuchs presumably already been liberated from patriarchy but also as a Christian who has already separated herself from idolatry. While Daly sees Christian and other paternal religions as patriarchal and therefore as part of the problem, Trible sees Christianity, biblical studies, and interpretation as part of the solution. In short, Trible’s “depatriarchalizing” strategy, touted broadly as a new feminist hermeneutical method, relies on the status quo ante when patriarchy was not yet introduced as a contemporary theoretical problem in the humanities and the social sciences.

Carol Meyers’s Historicizing Strategy Equally explicit in her repudiation of patriarchy as a structuring principle is Carol Meyers. She employs a historicizing strategy that serves as a norm for doing feminist biblical history. Meyers separates the biblical text from ancient Israelite history and, while acknowledging it in the former, she denies it in the latter. This practice is methodologically problematic as her historical reconstruction of women’s lives often derives from biblical sources. Meyers regards patriarchy in ancient Israel as a textual production of an elite royal, scribal, and priestly class that excluded women and most unprivileged village settlers. Thus, she acknowledges that the Hebrew Bible is a male-authored and male-centered text that needs to be consulted cautiously as a mirror or window about the social context of Israelite women’s daily lives. She defines as her task, such as in her book, Discovering Eve: Ancient Israelite Women in Context, to make visible Israelite women but with the goal of showing that patriarchal strictures did probably not affect them much.35 In this regard, Meyers’ work differs sharply from another foundational book in feminist historiography written by Gerda Lerner and entitled The Creation of Patriarchy.36 Whereas Meyers minimizes the effects of patriarchy on ancient Israelite society, Lerner defines patriarchy as a social system shaping the lives of women even before the emergence of royal hierarchies. According to Lerner, patriarchy is the historical context and foundation for later class hierarchies characterizing the history of the ancient Near East and Western civilization. In contrast, Meyers is oblivious to feminist studies that preceded her work, and so she simply assumes that patriarchy is a modern invention. Meyers’s objection is also based on unexamined assumptions about the significance of feminist studies in general. For instance, she asserts: “The dynamics of gender hierarchy, as I understand them, are historically specific. The concept of patriarchy is thus misleading unless it recognizes and deals with variations across time. If the idea of patriarchy is not fluid or flexible, then it

35  Carol Meyers, Discovering Eve: Ancient Israelite Women in Context (New York, NY / Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988; 1991). 36  Gerda Lerner, The Creation of Patriarchy (New York, NY / Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986).

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   171 may not be applicable to other or ancient modes of social life.”37 This assertion is out of place, as Lerner’s detailed and nuanced study reconstructs the creation of patriarchy with great attention to its evolution over time. Her historical analysis begins with the organization of the patriarchal family and moves to the more complex hierarchies of Mesopotamian city states.38 Her social history even encompasses the two millennia that preceded the emergence of ancient Israel and ranges over a much broader geopolitical context, including ancient Egypt, Babylon, and Assyria. Most importantly, Lerner’s reconstruction of the history of patriarchy places women at the center, questioning the assumptions of traditional, normative, and descriptive histories of the ancient Near East.39 While Meyers seeks to correct the surface exclusions of women from conventional histories of ancient Israel, she does not challenge the basic categories that frame them. This approach creates a compensatory, supplemental, and self-marginalizing history. Meyers’ history thus places women “in” frameworks that have already been defined and established, such as family, household, community, economy, or population. Meyers structures her feminist historiography that is called “compensatory” history writing. It seeks to make women visible and to create “herstories.”40 Gender in these “herstories” is understood descriptively as sexual difference rather than politically as a category of analysis. Sisterhoods and communities of women appear to be mutually supportive and harmonious groups to highlight the benefits of domesticity, maternity, and religious ritualism. Meyers applies this model to her analysis of what she believes to be femaleheaded families in rural communities.41 She asserts that the women’s groups performed “essential functions without which the economic survival and social stability of small pre-modern communities such as existed in ancient Israel would not have been possible.”42 This segregationist focus on women measures women’s value functionally similar to the ways of traditional historians highlighting women’s instrumental benefits.

Ilana Pardes’s Textualizing Strategy Ilana Pardes also focuses on “women” rather than patriarchy. Although she acknowledges the fictionality of female characters and male authorship, she treats the speeches attributed to them as authentic expressions of a universal femininity. She argues that speech acts attributed to biblical women by patriarchal authors reflect anti-patriarchal

37 Meyers, Discovering Eve, 29. 38 Lerner, The Creation of Patriarchy, 54–75. 39  Ibid., 36–53. 40  Joan Wallach Scott, Gender and the Politics of History (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1988). 41  Carol Meyers, “Women of the Neighborhood: Informal Female Networks in Ancient Israel,” in Ruth and Esther: A Feminist Companion to the Bible, ed. Athalya Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield University Press, 1999), 110–21. 42  Carol Meyers, “Women of the Neighborhood,” 228.

172   Esther Fuchs women’s “countertraditions.”43 The textualizing strategy posits that the female characters do not have any material, historical existence outside the biblical text. This strategy is therefore based on a paradox, or self-contradiction, to wit, that the “countertraditions” are real even though biblical women are best understood as products of the literary imagination. Yet if the women she discusses are fictional, how could they have created anti-patriarchal or any other traditions? As products of the male literary imagination, their speech acts should logically also be treated as fictional attributions, more likely to reflect the patriarchal ideology of the authors rather than as authentic rhetorical, textual, or even ancient-historical women. Pardes devotes her book to uncovering what previous generations of feminist critics apparently missed: the articulations attributable to biblical women. Yet, at the same time, Pardes also claims that the so-called “countertraditions” are textual fictions as if they were real so-called “countertraditions” traceable in the biblical text. Pardes counts herself among what she presents as an intellectually and theoretically advanced feminists of what she defines as “the third wave.”44 As I argue above, feminist scholars are wary of simplistic notions of inevitable progress and they advocate a genealogical historiography highlighting political commitment and social transformation. Viewed in this light, Pardes’s approach endorses not only traditional norms of academic scholarship, but also refers to feminist waves without any historical markers and all but ignores the already extensive research that has been done in feminist biblical studies. Her approach implicitly advocates a shift from feminist studies to traditional biblical studies, from scholarship engaged on behalf of the oppressed to the elitist definition of scholarship as a mark of individual merit. Her book begins with a critique of first- and second-wave feminism, specifically the work of Elisabeth Cady Stanton, Simone de Beauvoir, and Kate Millet.45 She faults them for their lack of interpretive sophistication and the inability to appreciate the textual complexity of the biblical account of Eve’s creation. She rejects my work as well, especially my critique of biblical sexual politics.46 Pardes claims Mieke Bal as her model and inspiration, notably Bal’s work on the book of Judges.47 Yet Bal challenges hegemonic masculinist biblical historiography, notably on the book of Judges, whereas Pardes avoids any critical assessments of normative ­biblical scholarship.48 Bal also exposes, analyzes, and critiques what she construes as the evolution of patriarchal institutions and the historical victimization of daughters in the book of Judges.49 Pardes, by contrast, avoids any serious engagement with patriarchy as a history or ideology. Yet she emulates Bal’s use of feminism as a modality

43  Ilana Pardes, Countertraditions in the Bible: A Feminist Approach (Cambridge, MA / London: Harvard University Press, 1992). 44  Ibid., 26. 45  Ibid., 13–25. 46  Ibid., 25–26. 47  Mieke Bal, Lethal Love: Feminist Literary Readings of Biblical Love Stories (Bloomington / Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1987); Mieke Bal, Murder and Difference: Gender, Genre, and Scholarship on Sisera’s Death (trans. Matthew Gumpert; Bloomington / Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1988); Mieke Bal, Death and Dissymmetry: The Politics of Coherence in the Book of Judges (Chicago, IL / London: The University of Chicago Press, 1988). 48  Mieke Bal, Death and Dissymmetry, 9–40. 49  Ibid., 69–94.

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   173 or methodological approach.50 While Bal understands patriarchy as a problem for biblical women, Pardes re-casts the problem as a symptom of textual intricacy. She presents patriarchal tradition in a dialogical relationship with women’s anti-patriarchal discourse: “My goal is to explore the tense dialogue between the dominant patriarchal discourses of the Bible and counter female voices which attempt to put forth other truths.”51 For the most part, however, Pardes frames this “dialogue” as a marital, domestic, and heterosexual affair and, above all, as textual rather than sexual politics.

Susan Ackerman’s Mythologizing Strategy The mythologizing strategy casts biblical women as products of the male imagination, as derivations, elaborations, and revisions of ancient Near Eastern mythologies. It is best illustrated by the work of Susan Ackerman. Whereas Trible, Meyers, and Pardes insist on the need to create new scholarly procedures to accommodate the identification of women as a gendered category of analysis, Ackerman returns to a descriptive approach that categorizes female characters as a topic of interest and an object of disengaged research. Ackerman does not combine hegemonic assumptions with feminist interventions. Rather, she endorses the status quo ante that prevailed in the 1960s and 1970s before feminism made its appearance as a scholarly discourse in biblical studies. Her use of traditional male-focused practices presents them as universal, neutral, and objective. She does not understand patriarchy as a problem, much as normative scholarship has done for centuries. Ackerman draws on this scholarship as a matter of fact, especially in her treatment of biblical female characters. The revalorization of the authority of traditional biblical criticism legitimizes the traditional majoritarian dominance of men as Bible scholars. It re-legitimizes the authority of traditional biblical scholarship which naturalized the status of women in the Bible and the profession. Ackerman’s affirmation of the traditional consensus is best understood as a neo-conservative approach to biblical women, one that challenges the scholarly validity of feminist work done so far on the subject. Susan Ackerman’s book, Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen: Women in Judges and Biblical Israel52 seeks to replace the specialized approach to biblical women with traditional procedures that objectify women as a topic of interest and that requires neither awareness of nor familiarity with feminist scholarship. Ackerman criticizes feminist biblical literary criticism on disciplinary grounds. She is especially adamant about the impropriety of literary criticism when she states: Most dangerous is the literary critic’s tendency to take methodologies developed in fields such as English and Comparative Literature, used there to describe American 50 Bal, Murder and Difference, 112–34. 51 Pardes, Countertraditions in the Bible, 4. 52  Susan Ackerman, Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen: Women in Judges and Biblical Israel (New York, NY / London: Doubleday, 1998).

174   Esther Fuchs and European fiction of the Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment eras, and then to apply these tools to a text that is decidedly not of the place, not of the time, and most significantly not of the genres that this sort of analysis is meant to address.53

The objection to literary criticism as an inappropriate disciplinary approach is typical of traditional historical criticism, a competing subfield within biblical studies. Claiming the history of religions as her specialization, Ackerman uses in her work antiquated literary terminology, including “types,” “images,” and “genres.” Her methodology consists of an odd mixture of rhetorical and historical criticism, normally referred to as biblical criticism, a speculative reconstruction of the text’s religious meanings. This practice enables the establishment of false and misleading homologies between the power attributed to imaginary goddesses and the social privilege of their human representatives. Feminist critics have debunked the hypothesis of women’s reflected or derived power already in the early 1980s to highlight the tensions and contradictions between myth and the material conditions of women’s lives under patriarchy.54 Ackerman makes another claim that disassociates her from feminist criticism, even within biblical studies. She explains her position in this astonishing statement: “Unlike Trible and Daly, that is, my interest has been to ask about the biblical materials within the context of their own time and not within the context of ours.”55 She affirms a traditional historical approach as a priority for her work and also considers it as distinctively different from Trible’s approach. In addition, Ackerman uses many abstract typologies that provide neither periodization nor any evolutionary narrative. Instead, her historical commentary fixes women’s alleged popular religion into an ahistorical, archetypal, circular framework that is disconnected from earlier goddess-centered primitive religious tradition or male-centered monotheistic religions succeeding and replacing them. Ackerman does not even attempt to account for the historical transition from one phase of religious consciousness to the next, although many feminist religious studies scholars have raised and debated this issue.56 She also does not relate historically or conceptually the warrior type to the seductress or the queen to the dancer. In short, Ackerman advances an anti-feminist stance as a matter of political principle rather than as a ­concern with contextual accuracy or historical reliability. 53  Ibid., 14. 54  Rosemary Radford Ruether, ed., Religion and Sexism: Images of Woman in the Jewish and Christian Traditions (New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, 1974); Clarissa W. Atkinson, Constance H. Buchanan, and Margaret Miles, eds., Immaculate and Powerful: The Female in Sacred Image and Social Reality (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1985). 55 Ackerman, Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen, 290. 56  Merlin Stone, When God Was a Woman (New York, NY: Harcourt Brace and Jovanovich, 1976); Naomi Goldenberg, Changing of the Gods: Feminism and the End of Traditional Religions (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1979); Judith Ochshorn, The Female Experience and the Nature of the Divine (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1981); The Politics of Women’s Spirituality: Essays on the Rise of Spiritual Power within the Feminist Movement, ed. Charlene Spretnak (New York, NY: Anchor Books, 1982). Women and Goddess Traditions in Antiquity and Today, ed. Karen L. King (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1997); Rosemary Radford Ruether, Goddesses and the Divine Feminine (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005).

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   175

Tikva Frymer-Kensky’s Idealizing Strategy The idealizing strategy presents women as heroic, strong, and prominent as it minimizes or ignores their textual marginality. It is best exemplified in Tikva Frymer-Kensky’s work. This strategy returns to the depatriarchalizing strategy, as advanced by Trible, and it largely ignores the hermeneutical strategies of Meyers, Pardes, and Ackerman. Importantly, Fryer-Kensky’s endorsement of the depatriarchalizing approach implicitly validates male-authored publications that either preceded or emulated Trible’s work.57 Fryer-Kensky’s approach is defensive scholarship that does not credit feminist scholarship for its interest in biblical women. Instead, she upholds male dominant exegetical authority when she highlights its presumed egalitarianism and objective non-tendentiousness.58 Its denial of patriarchy is apologetic and coupled with reframed narrative references to women as stories about women. Frymer-Kensky’s romanticized and idealized retellings of biblical texts deny the material exclusion of women from economic resources, social agency, literacy, historical presentation, and cultural meaning. Frymer-Kensky puts biblical women on a pedestal, granting them universal, religious, humanitarian, or national functions, so re-enshrining the idealizing tradition of a feminine mystique. Traditional apologists have a long tradition of relying on the strategy of idealization as a compensatory explanation for gender inequality. Frymer-Kensky’s approach consists of reading biblical references, including marginal ones as stories “about” women, expanding their social roles in her imaginative interpretation and presenting them as protagonists of specific biblical narratives and of the biblical (his)story in general. Her reconstruction does not recognize the textual marginality of women in the broader context. Her neologism of “women-stories” attributes to female biblical characters symbolic meaning. She allegorizes and metaphorizes the female characters turning them into primary national symbols, indeed into symbols of the nation as such. Her interpretive technique does not merely “read” the women of the Bible, as claimed by the title of her book, but it rewrites them. Yet Frymer-Kensky does not lay bare her strategy, nor does she reflect on it. Rather, she presents the meaning she constructs as inherent and integral to the biblical text. To the extent that she ignores the textual materiality of mediating the “women” she constructs, she performs an idealizing procedure.

57  Tikva Frymer-Kensky, “The Bible and Women’s Studies,” chap. in Studies in Bible and Feminist Criticism (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2006), 159–83. 58 John H. Otwell, And Sarah Laughed: The Status of Woman in the Old Testament (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1977); Leonard J. Swidler, Biblical Affirmations of Woman (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1979); James G. Williams, Women Recounted: Narrative Thinking and the God of Israel (Sheffield: Almond Press, 1982); Adin Steinsaltz, Biblical Images: Men and Women of the Book (trans. Yehuda Hanegbi and Yehudit Keshet; New York, NY: Basic Books, 1984).

176   Esther Fuchs Tikva Frymer-Kensky explains her view of what she defines as “women-stories” in this way: The stories, then, were not written in order to make statements about women. To understand why they were written, we have to look at each story intently, with all the techniques described below, and also consider them collectively, as a group, reading them in relation to one another instead of confining them to the context in which they occur individually.59

To look at each story intently, however, is not necessarily a feminist position. Rather, it is an interpretive technique borrowed by Bible scholars from literary criticism, or more precisely, the normative practice that dominated literary studies in the 1960s. This practice, generally known as the New Criticism, was subsequently questioned by feminist literary critics in the 1980s60 From the perspective of the postmodern 1990s, the literary techniques which Frymer-Kensky utilizes are no longer as new as she would have us believe when she asserts: “The many techniques and disciplines that biblical scholars use provide new perspectives and reveal many facets of the stories.”61 Though presented as a literary approach, the idealization of biblical women is theologically motivated. In this regard, it is pertinent to juxtapose Frymer-Kensky’s work to Judith Plaskow’s critical approach. Plaskow rejects the feminist acceptance of the cultural status quo and the limited quest for inclusion within an existing social system.62 She criticizes women’s exclusion from the patriarchal process of law giving, decision making, story writing, the creation of history, and the formulation of moral and religious principles. Plaskow problematizes the authoritarian and hierarchical normativity of biblical law, the patrilineal genealogy that shapes the biblical nation, the masculinist representation of an exclusive, asexual God, and many other norms that exist in religious traditions even today. Yet, in contrast, Frymer-Kensky minimizes the ongoing effects of patriarchal thinking and advocates separating them from the reading of women-stories. Plaskow contends that this separation is impossible without a thorough

59 Fryer-Kensky, Reading the Women of the Bible, xvii. 60  Gayle Greene and Coppelia Kahn, eds., Making a Difference: Feminist Literary Criticism (London / New York, NY: Methuen, 1985); Elizabeth A. Flynn and Patrocinio P. Schweickart, eds., Gender and Reading: Essays on Readers, Texts, and Contexts (Baltimore, MD / London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986); Shari Benstock, Feminist Issues in Literary Scholarship (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1987); Catherine Belsey and Jane Moore, eds., The Feminist Reader: Essays in Gender and the Politics of Literary Criticism (Oxford / Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1989; 1997); Mary Eagleton, Feminist Literary Theory (Oxford / Malden, MA: 1986; 1994); Robyn R. Warhol and Diane Price Herndl, eds., Feminisms: An Anthology of Literary Theory and Criticism (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1997). 61 Frymer-Kensky, Reading the Women of the Bible, xxiv. 62  Judith Plaskow, Standing Again at Sinai: Judaism from a Feminist Perspective (New York, NY: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990).

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   177 revaluation of values. In this sense, Frymer-Kensky further elaborates the neoliberal hegemonic feminist interpretive frame in biblical studies.

Moving Beyond Neoliberal Feminist Biblical Scholarship: A Conclusion Despite the considerable methodological differences among the five hermeneutical strategies employed in feminist biblical scholarship, the various works share a general rejection of a feminist definition of patriarchy. The denial of the conceptual, analytical, and critical utility of patriarchy is thus the most significant divide between women’s studies on the one hand and feminist biblical studies on the other hand. Women studies scholars have worked hard during the last four decades to intersect patriarchy with other culturally sanctioned oppressive regimes, such as racism, classism, colonialism, queer, or physical ability studies. The rejection of feminist theoretical work by feminist biblical scholars has led to a field that objectifies women and has contributed to the divisions, fragmentation, and disconnection within biblical feminist studies. Ironically, all hermeneutical strategies in feminist biblical studies, except for the mythologizing strategy, classify their readings as anti-patriarchal or non-patriarchal strategies. The mythologizing strategy is based on the neo-conservative assumption that patriarchy is an integral part of ancient history and should not present a scholarly issue for feminist scholarship. While most of the practitioners reviewed here consider their work as feminist, Ackerman does not. The historicizing strategy locates patriarchy in the text, specifically in the male, urban, and elite scribal class that produced the biblical texts, and places “women” in a historical context that is framed as egalitarian and protective of their interests. The textualizing strategy privatizes and psychologizes the meaning of patriarchy, locating it in heteronormative relationships, and subjective and erotic responses. Its claims to define “women” as figurations of femininity, speech acts, and discursive expressions within biblical texts framed as egalitarian and in itself implicitly anti-patriarchal. The idealizing strategy frames “women” in the biblical story framed as egalitarian and appreciative of women’s contributions to ancient Israel. In addition, the five hermeneutical strategies illustrate the current fragmentation of what should perhaps cautiously be defined as feminist biblical studies. The tendency of ignoring each other’s publications and to repeatedly present feminism as a newcomer to the field of biblical studies produces unnecessary repetitions. It also undermines any attempt to reconstruct an evolutionary outline of the field and to produce clarity about the mission and purpose of feminist exegesis. While some works reproduce earlier feminist positions that date back to the heyday of liberal feminism in the 1970s, other studies present repeatedly the methodological utility of feminist meaning in each disciplinary field. Accordingly, for the most part the feminist scholars examined in this essay critically ignore each other because they are divided by sub-disciplinary boundaries. For instance,

178   Esther Fuchs feminist theological critics and feminist historical exegetes address their respective (male dominant) specialized audiences even as they remain divided by practice, orientation, and method from feminist literary criticism. Furthermore, the sub-disciplinary loyalties of feminist scholars in biblical studies prioritize methodology over theory. This preference creates divisions, fissures, and tensions that have largely remained unaddressed. Consequently, theory and context which are fundamental to women’s studies are largely absent in feminist biblical scholarship. Since feminist biblical research lacks a common language that would consist of shared concepts and references, it can hardly be classified as a field. While theory has the potential to inhibit fragmentation, the historical consciousness of a shared context has the potential to prevent repetition. This essay thus advocates that feminist Bible scholars realign or at least balance their commitments by drawing on feminist scholarship in women’s studies as much as they draw on biblical studies. The current hegemonic neoliberal consensus promotes adaptation, recuperation, and validation. What is needed is a search for transformational knowledge, a shift in feminist biblical studies from the “biblical” to the “feminist.” Moreover, the frame of reference needs to be broadened in feminist biblical studies. It ought to include feminist theologians, historians, and literary critics outside of biblical studies. Such a broader framework, rooted in feminist studies outside of the field of biblical studies, would nurture the critical evaluation and contestation of the neoliberal work dominant in biblical studies during the past four decades. If women’s studies were the starting point, the current placement of feminist approaches alongside each other would pave the way to dialogical transaction and debate and to the clarification of a shared scholarly agenda. It would also enable feminist biblical exegetes to focus on the political implications of our work and compel us to reflect critically about the purpose and function of our work in light of impending professional and social change. It would foster the kind of critical analysis advocated in women’s studies and transform feminist biblical studies into a radical and transformative interrogation of biblical studies in general.

Bibliography Barrett, Michele. Women’s Oppression Today. London: Verso, 1984. Brown, Wendy. “American Nightmare: Neoliberalism, Neoconservatism and DeDemocratization,” Political Theory 34.6 (2006), 690–714. Ebert, Teresa L. Ludic Feminism: Postmodernism, Desire, and Labor in Late Capitalism. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 1999. Eisenstein, Zilla. “Constructing a Theory of Capitalist Patriarchy and Socialist Feminism,” Critical Sociology 25.2 (1999), 196–217. Fraser, Nancy. Fortunes of Feminism: From State Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis. London: Verso, 2013. Friedman, Susan. Mappings: Feminism and the Cultural Geographies of Encounter. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998.

Neoliberal Feminist Scholarship in Biblical Studies   179 Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2005. hooks, bell. Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 1984; 2000; 2015). Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Durham, NJ: Duke University Press, 1991. Rottenberg, Catherine. “The Rise of Neoliberal Feminism,” Cultural Studies 28.3 (2014), 418–37.

chapter 12

J ustif y i ng (Femi n ist) Biblica l St u die s i n a N eoliber a l Age John W. Fadden

The economization of American higher education in the last decades has forced various humanities disciplines to justify their existence as part of the secular undergraduate lib­ eral arts college. Biblical studies is not immune to this challenge. The neoliberal ra­tion­ al­ity that dominates higher education makes any justification for biblical studies tenuous. An intersectional (feminist) biblical studies, however, offers an alternative path for preparing critically informed ideal democratic citizens, a common aim of the liberal arts education.1 The overwhelming influence of the neoliberal logic and the political decisions to defund higher education likely means biblical studies will continue with limited resources to affect curricular changes.

Neoliberalism as Governing Rationality Neoliberalism invites debate over its usage. The term emerges in economic discourse in various places during the twentieth century. Economists and legal scholars, connected to the “Freiberg School” in post–World War I Germany, coined the term for a program to return to classical liberalism. Pro-markets Latin American economists adopted the term “neoliberalismo” in the 1970s. The term has been associated with various world 1  The parentheses (feminist) is intended to mark my unease to label my proposal as “feminist” as I am not sure it is the appropriate umbrella term for the ethos advocated since not all who advance intersectional biblical studies would classify themselves as feminist and would perhaps feel mislabeled having their work described under this title.

182   John W. Fadden leaders from Ronald Reagan and Margret Thatcher to Bill Clinton and Tony Blair to George W. Bush and Hillary Clinton.2 Neoliberalism has come to mean more than just an economic ideology and set of practices. It is a governing rationality encompassing the various spheres of life. As a political economy, neoliberalism promotes a “new” return to classical liberal economics. In the United States neoliberalism represents the ideology and policies enacted in response to the failures of the Keynesian welfare state to resolve the economic crises of the 1970s.3 Where previous iterations of capitalism tended to have state inter­ ventions into markets, especially in moments of social crises and failures of liberal capitalism, neoliberalism’s solution to crises and failures is to develop more free markets.4 It contends that public services provided by the state should be privatized and forced to compete in free markets.5 Likewise, the government should deregulate industries, allowing the marketplace to regulate. The state’s role in the economy should be limited to security of properly functioning free markets, introducing new markets when they do not exist, ensuring the integrity of money, and protecting private property rights.6 In times of crisis, the state should not intervene, as the market will self-correct. There are some new aspects of neoliberal capitalism. Neoliberalism shifts the notion of competition from an important process involving a large number of firms for main­ taining near-perfect markets and consumer choice to a process that results in giant corporations and “a paternalistic concern for ‘consumer welfare.’ ”7 Neoliberal influence reduces a company’s interests to shareholders’ interest alone, maximizing the company’s stock price.8 Neoliberalism has witnessed the unprecedented explosion of finance capitalism with debt markets for the masses and derivatives and future markets for the economic elites.9 At the same time, neoliberalism looks like a “return to the normal course of affairs for ordinary capitalism where the economy grows but so as to increase the concentration of wealth at the top.”10 In this sense, neoliberalism is not so much something new, it is the end game of capitalism that seeks to expel the government’s interference in free markets and to marketize the welfare state’s public goods and services to the benefit of economic elites. 2  Manfred B. Steger and Ravi K. Roy, Neoliberalism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), ix–x. 3  Michael C. Howard and John E. King, The Rise of Neoliberalism in Advanced Economies: A Materialist Analysis (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 2. 4  “The principal tenet of neoliberalism is that optimal outcomes will be achieved if the demand and supply for goods and services are allowed to adjust to each other through the price mechanism, without interference by government or other forces—though subject to the pricing and marketing strategies of oligopolistic corporations.” Colin Crouch, The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism (Malden, MA: Polity, 2011), 17. 5 Crouch, The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism, chap. 4. 6  David Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 2–3. 7 Crouch, The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism, 17. 8  Ibid., 57. 9  Ibid., 114. 10  Sanford Schram, The Return of Ordinary Capitalism: Neoliberalism, Precarity, Occupy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 6. See also, Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, 19.

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   183 Wendy Brown suggests that neoliberalism is better understood “as an order of normative reasoning” that has become “a governing rationality extending a specific formulation of  economic values, practices, and metrics to every dimension of human life.”11 Accordingly, neoliberalism governs as sophisticated “common sense”: “Within neoliberal rationality, human capital is both our ‘is’ and our ‘ought’—what we are said to be, what we should be, and what the rationality makes us into through its norms and construc­ tion of environments.”12 Human beings become and are only homo oeconomicus, whose project is to enhance one’s value and/or to attract others to invest in the person in all spheres of life, including education.13 Brown notes that the concern for value, capital appreciation, and growth is not merely to be understood in monetary terms. One exam­ ple that biblical studies instructors might experience is the student who takes a course with “Bible” in the title expects that their “devotional” or “spiritual” capital will appreci­ ate throughout the semester. Responsibilization, “forcing the subject to become a responsible self-investor and self-provider,”14 is one of the hallmarks of neoliberalism as a governing rationality. Brown thus argues: “Neoliberalism generates a condition of pol­ itics absent democratic institutions that would support a democratic public and all that such a public represents at its best: informed passion, respectful deliberation, aspira­ tional sovereignty, sharp containment of powers that would overrule or undermine it.”15 Since citizens are reduced to homo oeconomicus, “there are not motivations, drives, or aspirations apart from the economic ones, that there is nothing to being human apart from ‘mere life.’ ”16 Brown’s study of neoliberalism and its destructive effects on liberal democracy is pertinent for justifying biblical studies as a discipline in the undergradu­ ate liberal arts college. In the United States, neoliberalism has both racial and gendered effects.17 The nega­ tive effects are disproportionately experienced by women of color.18 Henry A. Giroux asserts: “the history of the changing economic and ideological conditions that gave rise to neoliberalism must be understood in relation to the corresponding history of race relations in the United States and abroad.”19 Indeed, neoliberalism in America is

11  Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution (Brooklyn, NY: Zone Books, 2015), 30. Brown, and others, is indebted to the work of Michel Foucault on governmentality. Brown engages primarily with Foucault’s conception of neoliberalism in Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolitics: Lectures at the College de France, 1978–79, trans. Graham Burchell (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008). 12 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 36. 13  Ibid., 33. 14  Ibid., 84. See also, Schram, The Return of Ordinary Capitalism, 4, 25. 15 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 39. 16  Ibid., 44. 17  Neoliberalism’s oft criticized globalizing effects in other countries are beyond my admittedly limited summary. 18  Keri Day, Religious Resistance to Neoliberalism: Womanist and Black Feminist Perspectives, Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). 19  Henry Giroux, Against the Terror of Neoliberalism: Politics Beyond the Age of Greed (Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers, 2008), 79.

184   John W. Fadden intimately intertwined with the new racism in the wake of the civil rights movement.20 Neoliberalism’s rhetoric claims the insignificance of race for individual success and is not a meaningful social factor.21 Yet neoliberalism’s vilification of welfare and public services often rests on coded racism. The private prison culture in neoliberal America is another example of racism’s continued existence.22 Further, Giroux suggests racial ­justice “loses its ethical imperative to a neoliberalism that embraces commercial rather than civic values, private rather than public interests, and financial incentives rather than ethical concerns.”23 Thus, the continued experience of racism is a crisis that ­neoliberalism denies and is unprepared to address. The effects of neoliberalism are also gendered. So-called “women’s work” is exploited under neoliberalism.24 In the business sphere, women continue to be paid lower wages than men for the same job, allowing companies to benefit from the differences. Potential government solutions to remedy this problem have fallen out of favor due to the costs companies would incur and the distaste for government regulation.25 Brown observes that neoliberalism naturalizes the heterosexual nuclear family with a male head of household and gender subordination in the process of naturalizing the free individual.26 Homo oeconomicus assumes the kind of autonomy that requires a gendered sexual division of labor.27 Those positioned as women are expected to conform to the model of homo oeconomicus. However, women also face the unacknowledged expecta­ tion of being femina domestica, the primary caregiver “in households, neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces,” for all “developing, mature, and worn-out human capital.”28 Under neoliberalism, Brown argues, “gender subordination is both intensified and

20  Randolph Hohle argues that racism is at the origins of American neoliberalism. Randolph Hohle, Race and the Origins of American Neoliberalism (Routledge Research in Race and Ethnicity 12; New York, NY: Routledge, 2015). 21  For a critical indictment of neoliberal racism, see Giroux, Against the Terror of Neoliberalism, 60–83. 22  On the connection between neoliberalism, incarceration, and racism, see Noah De Lissovoy, “Conceptualizing the Carceral Turn: Neoliberalism, Racism, and Violation,” Critical Sociology 39.5 (2012): 739–55. While not engaged in a discussion of neoliberalism, see Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (New York, NY: The New Press, 2012). 23 Giroux, Against the Terror of Neoliberalism, 65. 24  See Robin Truth Goodman, Gender Work: Feminism after Neoliberalism (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). 25  For a political example, since 1997, the U.S. Congress has regularly failed to pass a Paycheck Fairness Act to improve upon existing laws. For a legal example, in the spring of 2017, the U.S. Department of Labor requested salary information from Google as part of an ongoing investigation into systematic compensation disparities. Google argued that compiling the information would cost the firm $100,000 and 500 hours of work. In the firm’s opinion the request is too burdensome and logistically difficult for the technology firm to comply. Google also claims this violates employee privacy laws and that the government’s demands were unconstitutional overreaches. Sam Levin, “Accused of Underpaying Women, Google Says It’s Too Expensive to Get Wage Data,” The Guardian, May 26, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/26/google-genderdiscrimination-case-salary-records. 26 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 101. 27  Ibid., 103. 28  Ibid., 104–5.

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   185 fundamentally altered.”29 It is intensified through the privatization of public goods and services. With the decrease in public support for families, children, and the elderly, women are responsibilized to be “responsible for those who cannot be responsible for themselves.”30 Gender subordination is transformed by adding volunteer labor in schools and communities to the household labor that women disproportionately perform.31 Neoliberalism has dramatic consequences for democracy. First, it results in a few individuals with immense economic power to influence over political process.32 David Harvey warns: “The boundary between the state and corporate power has become more and more porous. What remains of representative democracy is overwhelmed, if not totally though legally corrupted by money power.”33 Second, the ideal neoliberal state is skeptical of democracy, governing by executive order and judicial decisions. It seeks to insulate key institutions from democracy.34 The neoliberal state that loses and corrupts democratic ideals may be doomed to authoritarianism, or even outright fascism.35 As Brown maintains, neoliberalism hollows out democratic values as “neoliberal ra­tion­al­ ity’s ascendance imperils the ideal, imaginary, and political project of democracy.”36 As a governing rationality, neoliberal logic is prevalent in the discourse of higher edu­ cation. An awareness of how neoliberalism manifests in higher education is requisite for justifying biblical studies as an undergraduate liberal arts field.

Neoliberalism and Higher Education: The Position of Wendy Brown Neoliberalism challenges higher education and the core of the liberal arts mission. The mission of the liberal arts is twofold. First, it aims “to provide a holistic educational formation for young adults” and, second, it intends “to serve the democratic good of associative living.”37 The first part of the mission relates to critical thinking; the second

29  Ibid., 105. 30  Ibid., 105. See also, Goodman, Gender Work, 8. Brown neglects the additional responsibilities women of color are forced to assume in relation to the racial effects of neoliberalism in the U.S. Women of color are disproportionately the subjects alienated by neoliberalism. See K. Day, Religious Resistance to Neoliberalism. 31 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 106. 32 Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, 34. 33  Ibid., 77–8. 34  Ibid., 66. 35  Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, 37. Harvey endorses Polayni’s view on the degeneration of freedom in Karl Polayni, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1954). 36 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 201. 37  Rebecca Chopp, Susan Frost, and Daniel H. Weiss, eds., Remaking College: Innovation and the Liberal Arts (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016), 2.

186   John W. Fadden part of the liberal arts’ mission is serving the social good.38 Yet, the idea of a social or a public good becomes harder to imagine in the neoliberal age. Neoliberal reforms to edu­ cation result in market logic saturating education policy, performance measurements, and growing inequalities in outcomes. Higher education has become a site of selfinvestment and appreciation of human capital, a credential to aid in one’s future value. This section outlines how American political theorist Wendy Brown describes the neo­ liberalization of higher education. Her treatment places higher education into the larger discussion of neoliberalism’s attack on liberal democracy and democratic citizenry in the United States. Brown’s appeal lies in uncovering neoliberalism’s saturation of higher education with marketized principles and rationality in ways that biblical scholars may not even notice, to the point that the classical liberal arts mission of developing informed democratic citizenry is imperiled, and with it any form of democracy worthy the name. Brown’s discussion of higher education focuses on the public university and college. While public schools differ from private universities and colleges, especially in terms of the disappearance of state funding or state’s control, Brown aptly describes the neoliber­ alization of higher education.39 For two centuries, the key premise of higher education has been that the liberal arts provide the tools for understanding the powers and prob­ lems engaged citizens require to have in democratic countries. Yet neoliberalism views higher education as primarily valuable to human capital development.40 Brown identi­ fies four related effects of neoliberal rationality on the liberal arts. First, “public goods of any kind are increasingly difficult to speak of or secure.”41 This effect makes the tradi­ tional argument of the liberal arts as a public good (because it cultivates ideal citizens for democracy) difficult. People are no longer seen as citizens of a democratic polity sharing power and certain common goods, spaces, and experiences. Rather they are investors and consumers.42 Second, democracy is “now conceived as requiring technically skilled human capital” and not as in need of educated citizens to sustain public life and com­ mon rule.43 The transformation of the notion of democracy challenges the liberal arts mission, since knowledge in the liberal arts does not instrumentalize knowledge for the development of human capital. Third, “subjects, including citizen subjects, are config­ ured by the market metrics of our time as self-investing human capital.”44 This position 38  Rebecca Chopp, “Remaking, Renewing, Reimagining,” in Remaking College, ed. Chopp, Frost, and Weiss, 13. Rebecca Chopp, writing about residential liberal arts college, sees three primary principles for its education: “critical thinking, moral and civil character, and using knowledge to improve the world.” 39  Brown briefly describes neoliberalism’s effect on higher education in her introduction, her fuller discussion occurs in chap. 6, “Educating Human Capital,” in Undoing the Demos, 22–4 and 175–200. Brown also notes that elite private schools have unique commodities—prestige and social networks—that make it possible for the private elites to not experience the same pressures faced by the liberal arts elsewhere; see Brown, Undoing the Demos, 192–3. 40  Ibid., 175–6. 41  Ibid., 176. 42  Ibid., 176. See also, Henry A. Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Education (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2014), 21. 43 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 177. See also, Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Education, 34. 44 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 177.

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   187 implies that students and perhaps even administrators and faculty self-invest in education because they believe it will contribute to human capital appreciation or avoid its depre­ ciation. As Brown explains: “Human capital is distinctly not concerned with acquir­ ing the knowledge and experience needed for intelligent democratic citizenship.”45 Fourth, “knowledge, thought, and training are valued and desired almost exclusively for their contribution to capital enhancement.”46 Knowledge is sought for a return on the invest­ ment.47 This final point is devastating for those who justify their discipline for the sake of gaining knowledge.48 The status of the liberal arts education, Brown suggests, “is eroding from all sides.”49 In the post–World War II era, widespread liberal arts education found support among families. They adhered to the idea that upward mobility required a liberal arts education and that democratic countries needed a well-educated citizenry. The extension of liberal arts education to the majority of the population, as opposed to an elite few, “was nothing short of a radical democratic event.”50 The United States postsecondary education was “contoured toward developing the person and citizen, not merely the job holder.”51 Higher education offered expanded individual opportunities along with the classical liberal ideal of acquiring a larger view of the world.52 Because of neoliberalism, this vision has been transformed. Now, there is only human capital.53 The liberal arts are depicted “as something for individuals to imbibe like chocolate, practice like yoga, or utilize like engineering.”54 The loss of the very idea of the public makes the idea of an engaged and educated citizen incoherent in neoliberal rationality. The neoliberal ordering of higher education “abjures the project of producing a public readied for participation in popular sovereignty.”55 Similarly, other values of the classical liberal arts curriculum such as social equality, liberty, and the worldly development of mind and character “cannot and do not defend themselves in terms of student desire or demand, economic necessity or benefit, or cost efficiencies within the university.”56 Rather, the mission to offer a liberal arts education to the many becomes disoriented toward mere job training.57 As higher education governance becomes oriented toward students as consumers and investors, the emphasis for degree z and courses is placed on job training and mar­ ketable research as distinct and apart from practices at variance with market norms 45 Ibid. 46 Ibid. 47  Ibid., 178. 48  For instance, Stanley Fish seems to advocate this knowledge-for-the-sake-of-knowledge position when he rejects attempts to justify academic work in non-academic terms; see Stanley Fish, Save the World on Your Own Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 98–152. 49  Brown states: “Cultural values spurn it, capital is not interested in it, debt-burdened families anxious about the future do not demand it, neoliberal rationality does not index it, and, of course, states no longer invest in it”; see Brown, Undoing the Demos, 180–1. 50  Ibid., 185. 51  Ibid., 185. 52  Ibid., 187. 53  Ibid., 182–3. See also, Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Education, 34. 54 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 188. 55  Ibid., 183–4. 56  Ibid., 192. 57  Ibid., 193.

188   John W. Fadden including “courses and teaching oriented toward developing capacities of reflection and insight, the acquisition of multiple literacies, and obtaining long, large view of human and nonhuman orders.”58 In short, the liberal arts face challenges in neoliberalized higher education. As Brown puts it: Students are pressured by families and cultural norms into choosing business, engineering, and preprofessional majors over those in the arts, humanities, and interpretive social sciences. Meanwhile, universities search incessantly for ways to trim costs by compressing time to degree and making extensive use of summer and online courses taught by casual academic labor, moves that in turn exert pressure to trim breadth and general-education requirements and also discourage double majors—the latter is significant because many public-university students currently finesse the “practicality” problem by combining a preprofessional major with one in the arts or humanities.59

While Brown thinks universities will survive, she anticipates “their core in under­ graduate liberal arts education offered by prestigious faculty researchers” will be lost.60 Increased casual academic labor, online instruction, and eroded faculty control over curriculum will further decrease the possibility of maintaining the ideal of a well-educated citizen.61 The liberal arts faculty, as neoliberal subjects, have configured their research to academic market norms that make faculty poorly situated for defending the liberal arts. Academic research becomes “increasingly illegible and irrelevant to those outside the profession and even outside individual disciplines, making it difficult to establish the value of this work to students or a public.”62 Academic market norms devalue under­ graduate teaching since only research enhances a scholar’s value.63 Adjunct labor fur­ ther delinks research and teaching, since teaching is increasingly meas­ured in terms of customer satisfaction by students who are oriented by a return-on-investment mentality for higher education.64 In short, the traditional view of the liberal arts faces challenges in the neoliberal age that values instrumental knowledge resulting in human capital appreciation that hollows out democratic values. Neoliberal reasoning saturates higher education, and so all students, faculty, and administrators are defined as neoliberal subjects. The emphasis on human capital and economic values has resulted in the liberal arts ­education losing its mission to prepare students to be informed citizens. Brown sums up her bleak assessment of higher education, observing that democracy “cannot survive the people’s wholesale ignorance of the forces shaping their lives and limning their future.”65

58  Ibid., 183. See also, Schram, The Return of Ordinary Capitalism, 135–40. 59 Brown, Undoing the Demos, 183. 60  Ibid., 194. 61  Ibid., 194–5. 62  Ibid., 196. 63  Ibid., 196. 64  Ibid., 197–8. 65  Ibid., 179. See also Schram, The Return of Ordinary Capitalism, 150.

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   189

Considering Neoliberal Economic Justifications for Biblical Studies in the Undergraduate Curriculum In light of the neoliberal institutional development in higher education, including in undergraduate teaching contexts, the field of biblical studies needs to consider its place in the liberal arts curriculum. As secular colleges and universities continue to down-size and cost-cut in academic departments and programs, biblical studies scholars have to defend their curricular existence in the liberal arts not only to administrators but also to students and the public. The question is whether the teaching of the Bible is still a justifiable curricular component in the liberal arts. Neoliberal economic considerations that focus on money, value, and human capital would then need to be identified in undergraduate teaching biblical studies. This line of thinking is certainly new to the humanities in gen­ eral and biblical studies in particular, but five neoliberal economic arguments stand out. Each of them poses unique challenges to the field, as this intellectual field of inquiry has never looked at itself on a cost-benefit scale.66 The five economic justifications regarding the neoliberal cost-benefit character of biblical studies are: first, that someone is willing to pay professors for teaching biblical studies; second, that students enroll in biblical studies courses; third, that learning to read the Bible teaches employment skills; fourth, that biblical studies is a liberal arts discipline appreciating human capital; and fifth, that biblical studies faculty are revenue generators.

Economic Justification No. 1: Cost-Efficiency First, an economic justification for teaching biblical studies courses at the college level is that “someone is willing to pay us to teach biblical studies.” This position acknowledges that biblical studies courses exist because colleges have historically offered such courses and hired professors with the required degrees and expertise in the discipline. It also recognizes that administrators are more concerned with financial metrics and budgets than academic disciplines. Since biblical studies courses usually exist in the liberal arts as a collection of courses serving general electives,67 the first justification can be reduced 66  It should be recognized that the justification of biblical studies also depends on the department in which the teaching of biblical studies is housed. I am not even going to attempt justifying biblical studies as a free-standing department in a secular liberal arts context. My assumption, perhaps unfounded, is that biblical studies courses are located in departments of religion or religious studies or philosophy and religious studies, or perhaps in a classics department. 67  The place of biblical studies in U.S.-American secular liberal arts colleges lacks data. We need good data on what courses are offered, what students take biblical studies courses, who the instructors are, and more. Anecdotal evidence suggests biblical studies courses are primarily general electives for non-majors, but this situation may also be the case for other academic disciplines.

190   John W. Fadden to a cost-efficiency argument. The question is whether biblical studies courses are offered more effectively and at a lower cost per student than other comparable course offerings. If not, they could be replaced with other elective courses, but if they are effectively offered with a lower cost per student, then Bible courses should be taught. Yet it is unknown if biblical studies course metrics show better outcomes for students than other compara­ ble courses with a higher cost-per-student. As long as it is unknown, Bible professors merrily continue teaching their courses and institutions are willing to pay them for it. Yet, the cost-efficiency argument has several problems. One of them is that colleges handle teaching loads and course offerings on a case-by-case basis that depends on the finances of a particular school and the decisions of specific administrators and depart­ ments. Measuring faculty teaching effectiveness is also a potential problem. While metrics for courses help to determine how effective a course is for accomplishing particular curricular goals, student evaluations of instructors risk privileging one type of instruc­ tor as well as racial and gendered biases. If administrators and committees depend too heavily on student evaluations to determine the effectiveness of biblical studies courses and instructors, it is likely that faculty hires, salary raises, or course offerings in biblical studies will be adversely affected. Further, the cost-efficiency argument does not clarify why biblical studies ought to be part of a liberal arts education.68 Historical consider­ ations substitute for content consideration for deciding the intellectual, cultural, or pedagogical reasons to offer undergraduate Bible courses. A related problem arises when administrators decide to not privilege biblical studies courses anymore. Perhaps they might argue that such courses are not cost efficient anymore and thus have to be eliminated from the curriculum. The cost-efficiency argument does not hold anymore under such circumstances and other neoliberally adaptive arguments must be devel­ oped to explain why the teaching of biblical studies needs to continue.

Economic Justification No. 2: Market Opportunity Another justification might then come into play, arguing that “students demand biblical studies courses.” This argument maintains that biblical studies is needed because stu­ dents enroll in them. As such, it is an essential companion argument to the first justifica­ tion. If general electives are assessed as a market opportunity and biblical studies courses are part of those electives, administrators are likely to see biblical studies courses as a necessary discipline within the liberal arts, especially when these courses are filled to capacity. General elective courses compete for students, and so there are winners and 68  Matthew C. Baldwin, “The Touchstone Text: A Forensic Rational for Biblical Studies in American Liberal Education” in Teaching the Bible in the Liberal Arts Classroom, ed. Jane S. Webster and Glenn S. Holland (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012), 17. “But although it may be easy for biblical scholars to convince administrators (or themselves) that biblical studies can fit into liberal education, there has yet to emerge a persuasive account of why biblical studies ought to remain in its demonstrably privileged position.”

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   191 losers in the market. If biblical studies courses are filled, then the field is a winner in a competitive market. But this argument is also problematic for four reasons. First, not every biblical scholar is a popular professor teaching courses that reach and exceed enrollment numbers. The market argument puts all the weight onto the shoulders of the teachers, turning them into entertainers, “easy” graders, or otherwise attractive to their student clientele. Ultimately, it is an unsustainable pedagogical situation. Second, the curricular situation for biblical studies courses may, in fact, be particularly dire when students as the “the market” do not enroll in Bible courses anymore.69 Third, the idea of leaving the course offerings to market forces assumes that the market has adequate knowledge of the courses and why they should be enrolled in this or that course. Demand also does not necessarily take into account the quality of student learning or of instruction. Fourth, the market opportunity argument depends on the existence of a market in which students choose courses from a liberal arts curriculum. But what happens if degree programs no longer require students to take liberal arts courses? Since neoliberalism demands leaner undergraduate programs that move toward the professionalization of degrees, the liberal arts requirements for college degrees may be in danger as a whole. Once compul­ sion is removed, the market-demand argument might turn against biblical studies. If, as Brown suggests, anxious, debt-ridden students enroll in marketable degrees, Susanne Scholz is probably correct when she states: “The point is that the quest for marketable degrees does not include Bible courses, and hence the curricular status quo does not attract many learners beyond a perhaps-required introductory course.”70 Without compulsion the market will likely dry up.

Economic Justification No. 3: Employment Skills The third justification views biblical studies courses as offering “skills for employment.” As Matthew Baldwin notes, the notion that undergraduate biblical studies is intended to train the next generation of biblical scholars or clergy is “nonsensical.”71 Thus, the third justification appeals to the skills developed in biblical studies courses as transferable to the “real world.” Among them are critical thinking, close reading, and effective oral and written communication, to name just a few. 69  Another place where more data would be useful would be to see if enrollment numbers across liberal arts based biblical studies support the market-demand argument when compared to non-biblical studies liberal arts courses. If such information was available, administrators might use it to evaluate the instructors who do not meet the general numbers or who exceed them. This would “responsibilize” instructors to meet enrollment goals in new ways. 70  Susanne Scholz, “Occupying Academic Biblical Teaching: The Architecture of Educational Power and the Biblical Studies Curriculum,” in Teaching the Bible in the Liberal Arts Classroom, ed. Webster and Holland, 41. 71  Baldwin, “The Touchstone Text,” 24.

192   John W. Fadden Yet this position also faces a significant challenge. Even if the field of biblical studies taught these skills well, perhaps students would be better served by more intentionally developing these skills within a practical program related to their preprofessional major. For example, many colleges add traditional humanities elements to their undergraduate business degrees. It does not take an accounting professor to figure out what comes next. In the neoliberal college, redundancies are eliminated, costs are reduced, degrees are completed faster, and the focus is on technical knowledge accommodating marketable degrees. If biblical studies are no longer needed to teach transferable skills, what place does it have in the neoliberal driven curriculum?

Economic Justification No. 4: Human Capital Appreciation The fourth justification seeks to define biblical studies courses as opportunities for “human capital appreciation.” For Gary Becker, investment in human capital includes activities that influence future monetary (earnings) and psychic (consumption) income by increasing the resources in people.72 It is difficult to suggest that one’s monetary earn­ ings will be higher due to enrolling in biblical studies courses. Perhaps biblical studies courses provide students with resources they might capitalize on in their future, but it is difficult, if not impossible, to quantify. From dinner party conversation topics to social justice organizing rhetoric, the Bible is a resource with cultural power to be mined and exploited for gain. But it is perhaps more readily apparent that biblical studies courses increase the psychic income of students who enroll in them. Students seeking to develop their “spiritual” or “devotional” capital will probably see considerable value in taking such courses. However, two objections counter the idea of viewing biblical studies as opportunities to develop human capital. One relates to an often-observed dissonance. If biblical stud­ ies courses are the place for investing in one’s human capital to increase psychic income, why do some students not attend free bible study programs at their local churches or synagogues? It is thus unclear what value undergraduate courses in academic Bible studies offer to build human capital. Biblical studies professors are likely to explain that they teach the historical contexts, cultural reception, and critical analysis of biblical lit­ erature that assist students to better understand the Bible. Yet this counterargument seems weak, especially in light of tuition costs. Perhaps students are not interested in developing human capital in a spiritual direction after all. Another objection to the human capital argument is that it is not the job of biblical scholars in secular liberal arts

72 Gary S. Becker, Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis, with Special Reference to Education (second ed.; New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1975), 9. While Becker focuses on the economic effects of education, he does not mean “to imply that other effects are unimportant, or less important than the economic ones” (11).

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   193 colleges to ensure the appreciation of their students’ spiritual capital.73 Most importantly, biblical scholars are not trained in this way. The argument thus seems to privilege Christianity or Judaism in supposedly secular liberal arts classrooms.74

Economic Justification No. 5: Revenue Generation The fifth justification looks at “biblical studies as a revenue generator.” Since scholars in neoliberally defined colleges function as entrepreneurs, biblical scholars operate within a prestige/reputation economy. If their human capital benefits their employing institu­ tions, they keep biblical studies courses in their school’s curriculum. Thus, when a scholar’s research, public appearances, and media engagements bring positive publicity to the school, administrators “capitalize” on the scholarly work and attract financial sup­ port from the school’s alumni/ae and corporate as well as private donors. By bringing external grant money to the college, biblical scholars cover their research expenses and prove their value to their schools. There are numerous issues with this fifth justification that defines biblical scholars as revenue generators. Most importantly, not every scholar may succeed in the scarce grant environment that lacks corporate, industry, or military connections. Thus, even when individual scholar-entrepreneurs carve out a secure place through grants and other revenue streams, there is little in biblical studies research making it a revenue generator for undergraduate programs and schools. Moreover, the notion of scholars as revenue generators places the responsibility on individual faculty members. If they do not generate income for their schools, their continued employment will be in jeopardy. Another concern relates to the fact that government funding of the humanities faces serious budgetary scrutiny. Then there are the potential trade-offs for transforming biblical studies into a revenue generator. Are there ethical, political, and religious lines that might infringe on academic freedom or academic standards, especially when grant money becomes exces­ sive? How might biblical scholars legitimize projects that are not secular and academic, but religious and theological? Hector Avalos offers pointed criticism of academic biblical studies when he states: “[A]cademia, despite claims to independence, is still part of an ecclesial-academic complex that collaborates with a competitive media industry.”75 Finally, the notion of biblical studies professors as revenue generators emphasizes research and not teaching. As Brown argues, the neoliberal academic economy encourages faculty to self-invest in research to increase their human capital, but it deemphasizes teaching since the academic market does not value it. What then is the value of teaching biblical studies courses in the undergraduate liberal arts classroom? 73  But see Whitney Bauman, Joseph A. Marchal, Karline McLain, Maureen O’Connell, and Sara M. Patterson, “Teaching the Millennial Generation in the Religious and Theological Studies Classroom,” Teaching Theology and Religion 17.4 (2014): 301–22. 74  See Caryn D. Riswold, “Teaching the College ‘Nones’: Christian Privilege and the Religion Professor,” Teaching Theology and Religion 18.2 (2015): 133–48. 75  Hector Avalos, The End of Biblical Studies (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2007), 15.

194   John W. Fadden None of these considerations offer convincing arguments for teaching biblical studies as a vital part of the liberal arts. One of the problems with neoliberal economic justifica­ tions is that they account only for things with an assigned economic value. Yet, a liberal arts education is a merit good that goes beyond mere economic enumeration.76 Merit goods have a visible component that is reduced to human capital under neoliberalism and a public good component, such as the benefit to society to have informed citizens. Unfortunately, neoliberal rationality only recognizes the visible component whereas biblical studies, as part of the liberal arts, is better seen as a public good. The next section discusses how to reframe biblical studies as a public good in the form of intersectional (feminist) biblical studies.

Intersectional (Feminist) Biblical Studies and Neoliberalism The public good component of higher education is captured in the aim of the liberal arts to cultivate ideal informed, democratic citizens. Rebecca Chopp argues: Our country is in desperate need of what the liberal arts can offer. A serious crisis deeply linked to the failure of individuals in democratic communities to find common ground is leading many citizens to lose faith in their leaders, in their communities that are increasingly polarized, and in a long-held sense of the common good. Current practices of democratic community such as tolerance, respect for others, and open debate are becoming anemic and are unable to provide the robust support that a thriving society needs.77

The liberal arts offer value for the survival of democracy from neoliberalism’s assault on it. In order to justify biblical studies as part of the liberal arts curriculum, scholars of biblical studies need to participate in the public good mission of the liberal arts. An intersectional (feminist) biblical studies approach attentive to the broader reception history78 and use of the Bible offers a curricular model that aids in creating informed democratic citizens. First, undergraduate biblical studies in the liberal arts curriculum 76 Crouch, The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism, 37. 77  Chopp, “Remaking, Renewing, Reimagining,” 21. Also see. Giroux, Neoliberalism’s War on Education, 142. 78  Some forty-five years ago, Wilfred Cantwell Smith suggested how the study of the Bible might be done in religious studies. I would like to consider “reception history” from this perspective. Wilfred Cantwell Smith, “The Study of Religion and the Study of the Bible,” JAAR (1971): 131–40. See also, Timothy Beal “Reception History and Beyond: Toward the Cultural History of Scripture,” BibInt 19 (2011): 357–72; Timothy Beal, The Rise and Fall of the Bible: The Unexpected History of An Accidental Book (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011).

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   195 should be intersectional in its approach. Patricia Hill Collins and Sirma Bilge provide a general description of intersectionality: Intersectionality is a way of understanding and analyzing the complexity in the world, in people, and in human experiences. The events and conditions of social and political life and the self can seldom be understood as shaped by one factor. They are generally shaped by many factors in diverse and mutually influencing ways. When it comes to social inequality, people’s lives and the organization of power in a given society are better understood as being shaped not by a single axis of social division, be it race or gender or class, but by many axes that work together and influence each other. Intersectionality as an analytic tool gives people better access to the complex­ ity of the world and of themselves.79

While intersectionality has become a buzzword, womanist and black feminist biblical studies have always been intersectional. As Nyasha Junior notes: “In general, ­womanist scholarship utilizes the gains of feminist scholarship but attempts to move beyond gendered-focused analysis. Womanist approaches stress the concept of intersectionality.”80 Gender, race, sexuality, and class are but a few of the intersecting analytical lenses womanist approaches adopt. Womanist biblical scholars have produced critical work for studying the Bible that is relevant to undergraduate biblical studies in the liberal arts.81 The intersectional analysis of biblical texts and the grounding of the analysis in contemporary communities makes womanist scholarship a critical model for students as they learn how to read cultural texts.82 Second, undergraduate biblical studies as part of the liberal arts curriculum should be attentive to the reception history of the Bible and how people read the Bible. Intersectional (feminist) biblical studies provides liberal arts students with critical lenses for looking at the Bible as an ancient text as well as a cultural text that is used 79  Patricia Hill Collins and Sirma Bilge, Intersectionality (Key Concepts; Malden, MA: Polity, 2016), 2. 80  Nyasha Junior, “Womanist Biblical Interpretation,” in Engaging the Bible in a Gendered World: An Introduction to Feminist Biblical Scholarship in Honor of Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, ed. Linda Day and Carolyn Pressler (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2006), 39. 81  Weems offers two early works, Renita J. Weems, Just a Sister Away: Understanding the Timeless Connection between Women of Today and Women in the Bible (New York, NY: Warner Books, 1988) and Renita J. Weems, Battered Love: Marriage, Sex, and Violence in the Hebrew Prophets (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1996). Some recent works include Mitzi J. Smith, ed., I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2015); Nyasha Junior, An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015); Gay L. Byron and Vanessa Lovelace, eds., Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016). See also, Wilda C. Gafney, Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to Women of the Torah and the Throne (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2017). 82  Womanist biblical studies is not the only kind of intersectional (feminist) biblical studies, but serves as a representative of the sort of approach to biblical studies that supports the aims of the cultivation of ideal citizens. As a non-African American non-woman, I hesitate to appropriate the title “womanist” for the project. Rather, it serves as a model for how biblical scholars might consciously perform intersectional analyses.

196   John W. Fadden by contemporary communities. In the United States context, the approach allows undergraduates to investigate the Bible as a cultural text.83 Students will explore how the Bible and its interpretation have been sites of struggle throughout the history of the United States, from the earliest colonization and exploration by Europeans to the current era. Intersectional (feminist) approaches will also inform students about the Bible around the globe, as intersectional (feminist) approaches challenge normative “objective” biblical readings and show the subjective nature of any biblical exegesis and its consequences in the world. As a part of the liberal arts curriculum the intersectional approach supports the aim of the liberal arts to produce informed citizens. Undergraduate biblical studies intro­ duce students to various scholarly and non-scholarly interpretations, as students learn to assess the biblical texts and their effects in society.84 Students begin to see the Bible as a cultural text. They also learn to critically evaluate texts from multiple perspectives and consider what is at stake, what is gained and lost, and who matters in the arguments. Importantly, intersectional (feminist) approaches reject the reduction of the human to homo oeconomicus. Biblical studies courses provide students with a context to ask questions about humanity and to look at how other humans—writers and interpreters of the Bible—have struggled with questions about their own humanity. Since biblical studies courses are developed as a secular learning environment, student come to realize that the Bible is one text among many from different cultures and eras. Thus, biblical studies courses can, and should, be thought of as a public good that belongs in liberal arts education. Although Avalos deems the Bible to be “irrelevant” for today,85 this view­ point does not mean that its scholarly study is irrelevant. Rather, as a collection of human texts with considerable historical and cultural impact of global proportions, the Bible continues to influence human communities. Students thus benefit from a robust understanding of the Bible’s origins, its reception history, and its uses and abuses in his­ tory. If we were to abandon the academic study of the Bible in the liberal arts context at this historical moment, it would cause public harm. It surrenders biblical text to those who use it to subjugate and oppress fellow human beings even today.

83  Baldwin, “The Touchstone Text,” 25. For example, Baldwin suggests the Bible as a touchstone text is important for the U.S., citing Pew stats that the majority of students either are or will be selfidentifying Christians, others non-Christians have to come into contact with Christians: “this demographic reality creates a perennial pressure on the academy . . . to include discourse about the Bible in the curriculum.” Two recent contributions for the Bible and American culture: Claudia Setzer and David A. Shefferman, eds., The Bible and American Culture: A Sourcebook (London: Routledge, 2011); Philip Goff and Arthur E. Farnsley II, eds., The Bible in American Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 84  See Glenn S. Holland, “ ‘Not as the Scribes’: Teaching Biblical Studies in the Liberal Arts Context,” in Teaching the Bible in the Liberal Arts Classroom, ed. Webster and Holland, 56–64. 85 Avalos, The End of Biblical Studies, 17.

Justifying (Feminist) Biblical Studies in a Neoliberal Age   197 However, it must be acknowledged that the public-good justification for biblical studies requires an alternative curriculum to the dominant historical critical one.86 Sadly, the prime challenge to implementing curricular changes to intersectional (feminist) biblical studies in the neoliberal age is economic. The academic marketplace has limited investments in curricular development when the changes do not provide an immediate economic return on investment. The academic market encourages tenured and tenuretrack faculty to focus on research rather than on curriculum and pedagogical matters. Contingent faculty lack the resources to make changes to their course offerings. In her discussion on biblical studies as part of the liberal arts curriculum Scholz observes that “[n]eoliberal interests endorse investments in business, engineering, and science departments while humanities receive neoliberal glances of suspicion.”87 Biblical stud­ ies thus is in “survival mode”: “Money is tight, socio-cultural and political support often minimal, and intellectual space for curricular exploration is rare. Neoliberal authorities demand justifications of the curricular status quo and if they are not forthcoming, degrees, departments, and even entire schools disappear.”88 A neoliberal future does not look promising for the teaching of biblical studies in undergraduate liberal arts settings.

Conclusion Like other undergraduate humanities fields in the liberal arts, biblical studies survive on a case-by-case basis in a neoliberal age. This essay has explored five neoliberal economic arguments that biblical studies scholars might use to justify the field’s presence in a liberal arts education. First, biblical studies courses are cost-efficient; second, biblical studies courses meet market demands; third, biblical studies courses teach employment skills; fourth, biblical studies courses allow students to appreciate their human capital; and fifth, biblical scholars as entrepreneurs offer their employing schools additional revenue streams. Yet the discussion also indicated that each justification is problematic. Economic justifications fall short for biblical studies because the discipline is not directed toward enhancing the future monetary earnings of undergraduate students. As a collection of courses, biblical studies requires significant time investment that take students’ attention away from “practical,” preprofessional courses that offer visible returns on the human capital of the students. Thus, undergraduate biblical studies might have a place in the neoliberal curriculum only if students, administrators, faculty, and the public affirm the ideal of the liberal arts. 86  Collin Cornell and Joel M. Lemon, “How We Teach Introductory Bible Courses: A Comparative and Historical Sampling,” Teaching Theology & Religion, 19.2 (2016), 114–42. But note their study rests on the limited information available from course syllabi which may or may not capture all of the variety the instructor employs in the classroom. See Caryn A. Reeder, Tat-siong Benny Liew, Jane S. Webster, Alicia J. Batten, and Chris Frilingos, “Response to ‘How We Teach Introductory Bible Courses,’ ” Teaching Theology & Religion, 19.2 (2016): 143–53. 87  Scholz, “Occupying Academic Biblical Teaching,” 33. 88  Ibid., 34.

198   John W. Fadden An intersectional (feminist) biblical studies has the potential to uphold the democratic ideals and mission of the liberal arts to cultivate informed democratic citizens. By teach­ ing students to approach the Bible and its interpreters with multiple analytical lenses, such as gender, race, class, sexuality, or disability, biblical studies courses prepare stu­ dents to better understand an important cultural and religious text. By learning about the Bible’s reception history and its varied uses and abuses in its various reading com­ munities, students will develop informed notions of the Bible as a cultural and religious text. Such courses may, in fact, contribute to the public good, but the problem is, of course, that neoliberal reasoning does not value public goods. The saturation of the neoliberal convictions in higher education threatens both the liberal arts and undergraduate biblical studies. The intersectional (feminist) biblical studies approach requires changes in the traditional biblical studies curriculum that moves it away from historical criticism. Yet according to neoliberal convictions, curricular changes require investment in human capital. Unfortunately, the academic economy values investment in research and publication over investment in teaching or the cur­ riculum. As a result, the economic incentive to adopt changes is minimal. Yet without making curricular changes that challenge the neoliberal reasoning, the field of biblical studies remains stuck in the dominant neoliberal discourse, adhering to the notion that higher education is an economic good for individuals. Consequently, the academic teaching of the Bible will become the domain of an elite few who do not have to concern themselves with the financial realities of higher education. The prospect that feminist, womanist, or any other intersectional approach to the Bible will survive, much less thrive, in the neoliberal higher education paradigm seems unlikely.

Bibliography Brown, Wendy. Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution. Brooklyn, NY: Zone Books, 2015. Byron, Gay  L., and Vanessa Lovelace, eds. Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics: Expanding the Discourse. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016. Crouch, Colin. The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism. Malden, MA: Polity, 2011. Day, Keri. Religious Resistance to Neoliberalism: Womanist and Black Feminist Perspectives. Black Religion/Womanist Thought/Social Justice. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. Giroux, Henry A. Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2014. Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. Hill Collins, Patricia, and Sirma Bilge. Intersectionality. Malden, MA: Polity, 2016. Junior, Nyasha. An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015. Smith, Mitzi, ed. I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2015. Webster, Jane  S., and Glenn Stanfield Holland, eds. Teaching the Bible in the Liberal Arts Classroom. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012.

chapter 13

Eu ropea n Femi n ist Biblica l Schol a rship i n the N eoliber a l Er a Hanna Stenström

The advertisement of a book about the experiences of early career feminist academics in today’s neoliberal universities states: Higher education is fast-changing, increasingly market-driven, and precarious. In this context, entering the academy as an early career academic presents both challenges and opportunities. Early career academics frequently face the prospect of working on fixed term contracts, with little security and no certain prospect of advancement, while constantly looking for the next role. Being a feminist academic adds a further layer of complexity: the ethos of the marketising university where students are increasingly viewed as “customers” may sit uneasily with a politics of equality for all. Feminist values and practice can provide a means of working through the challenges, but may also bring complications.1

Times have changed since the emergence of feminist scholarship in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Gone are the days when female feminist scholars of various fields decided to turn their feminist-movement work into academic research and to create feminist knowledge out of androcentrically dominated concepts, histories, texts, and stories. Early feminists were part of the second-wave women’s movement, creating knowledge from women’s experiences. Topics, such as sexual violence, received scholarly investigation for the first time in the history of academic research. Hitherto neglected topics and 1  The quotes are from the website of the publishing company presenting Rachel Thwaites and Amy Pressland, eds., Being an Early Career Feminist Academic: Experiences and Challenges (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017). This book is a collection of case studies from different countries and academic disciplines addressing the consequences of neoliberalism in academia. The volume includes personal witnesses and research studies. For the website, see https://www.palgrave.com/gp/ book/9781137543240 [accessed January 31, 2019].

200   Hanna Stenström scholarly areas of investigation started to become important in academic teaching and research, as feminist scholars developed feminist theories with which they examined the experiences of variously located women. Similarly, feminist biblical exegetes began interpreting the sacred texts of their religious traditions in the attempt to expose patriarchal structures, practices, and theories. Often feminist exegetes aimed for transforming the texts toward gender justice and equality. Sometimes they aimed to expose the texts for their misogyny, heteronormativity, and general sociopolitical, culture, and religious oppressive nature. In this way, feminist scholars have been part of larger movements for social change. To this day, feminists investigate how gender ideologies of patriarchal societies shape academic institutions, how processes of producing and transmitting knowledge favor the male subject, and how what counts as knowledge is profoundly biased toward androcentric assumptions within variously defined systems of domination. As in all fields of feminist and gender studies, some feminist scholars maintain that feminist scholars must also be sociopolitical activists. Thus, for instance, some biblical scholars have practiced their activism within their religious communities to adhere to the conviction that feminist academic work must be put into political practice. Other feminists contend that even strictly academic work is political work because academic research and teaching are central to societal cohesion. As feminist scholars write, publish, and teach, they already work as social and political actors, without the need for them to engage in further political activism. From the beginning, feminist research asserted that strong connections exist between knowledge and power. Feminist scholars have thus developed different theories for understanding these connections. For instance, standpoint feminist theories and feminist poststructuralism are well-known feminist theories that account for the epistemological implications and assumptions of feminist knowledge and power. In other words, feminist scholars belong to a larger group of critical scholars who recognize the political character of the creation and transmission of knowledge. Unsurprisingly, then, most feminist scholars, including feminist biblical scholars, share the conviction that it is possible and indeed necessary to integrate research, writing, and teaching for the promotion of democracy, with an emphasis on gender equality in the world. Over the last few decades, feminist scholars have gradually recognized the necessity to relate gender analyses to other structures of domination, such as race, ethnicity, and class, and to understand all of these structures as being part of interlocking systems of social, political, economic, cultural, and religious oppression. More recently, feminist scholars confront yet another element in the interlocking systems of oppression. The emergence of “the neoliberal university” challenges the very identity of feminist scholarship and the very existence of feminist scholars. Academic workers, including feminist scholars, face economic and institutional precarity and the increasing expectation to monetize their academic work within neoliberal academic institutions. Feminist Bible scholars also experience the neoliberal university although the circumstances are different according to country, university system, or institution. The neoliberal uni­ver­sity with all its difficulties is a daily reality for some feminist Bible scholars while others work at

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   201 academic institutions that have not (yet) implemented the same degree of austerity measures so characteristic of neoliberalism. Nevertheless, the emergence of “the neoliberal university” is an increasing reality. More specifically, the so-called Bologna Declaration was implemented by twentynine education ministers from across Europe since the late 1990s.2 Committed to harmonizing the architecture of the European higher education system, the ministers wanted to ensure comparability of the academic standards and higher-education qualifications in the many regions and countries across Europe. The institutional changes involved not only the twenty-eight members of the European Union, including the U.K., but a total of forty-eight European countries.3 Defined by many neoliberal assumptions and characteristics, the Bologna Process has been criticized for neoliberalizing historically grown and established European universities.4 Nowadays, all feminist biblical scholars in Europe work within this newly implemented neoliberal system. Despite local or country-wide differences, all of us need to address the challenges of the Bologna Process and the increasing neoliberalization of European academic labor. Different starting points come to mind for the analysis of the current conditions of feminist academic labor at neoliberal universities. One starting point would be based on the sharing of experiences. Another starting point could be Angeliki Alvanoudi’s essay entitled “Teaching Gender in the Neoliberal University.”5 Alvanoudi’s depicts the positive and negative consequences of the Bologna Process for women’s and gender studies programs in Europe. The many publications appearing in the essay elaborate on the Bologna Process from feminist perspectives. It becomes obvious that the Bologna Process is part of the neoliberalization of research and higher education in Europe, and that European feminist scholars have to examine and develop proposals to move beyond the imposed institutional limitations. The current essay proceeds in three sections. One section introduces the nature and characteristics of neoliberalism. Another section discusses the characteristics of the neoliberal university. Yet another section outlines how feminist biblical scholars think about neoliberal principles, ideas, and developments in (feminist) biblical studies. The conclusion outlines a feminist future for resisting the neoliberally designed universities, especially within the European context. 2  “Sorbonne Joint Declaration: Joint Declaration on Harmonisation of the Architecture of the European Higher Education System.” Available at http://www.mab.hu/web/doc/kulfold/Sorbonne_ declaration.pdf [accessed June 7, 2019]. 3  For information about the Bologna Process see the official web site: https://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/higher-education/bologna-process-and-european-highereducation-area_en. 4  See, e.g., David Palfreyman, “The Legal Impact of Bologna Implementation: Exploring Criticisms and Critiques of the Bologna Process,” Education and the Law 20.3 (2008): 249–57. 5  Angeliki Alvanoudi, “Teaching Gender in the Neoliberal University,” in Daniela Gronold, Brigitte Hipfl, and Linda Lund Pedersen, Teaching with the Third Wave: New Feminists’ Explorations of Teaching and Institutional Contexts (Teaching with Gender: European Women’s Studies in International and Interdisciplinary Classrooms 4), Stockholm: Centre for Gender Studies: Stockholm University, 2009, 37–54, here pp. 38–39: available as: https://www.erg.su.se/polopoly_fs/1.39112.1320403013!/Teaching_ With_The_Third_Wave.pdf [accessed June 6, 2019].

202   Hanna Stenström

What is Neoliberalism? The term “neoliberalism” has several meanings.6 In economics, for example, neoliberalism is defined as a particular contemporary form of (global) capitalism.7 Manfred B. Steger and Ravi  K.  Roy published a comprehensive introduction on neoliberalism, entitled Neoliberalism: A Very Short Introduction.8 The book focuses on the relations between neoliberalism and other forms of liberalism. It also discusses neoliberalism as a political and economic project, which included the political agenda of the British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, and the U.S.-American president, Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. Thus, Steger and Roy consider neoliberalism as “a rather broad and general concept” that refers to “an economic model or paradigm that rose to prominence in the 1980s.”9 According to their definition, neoliberalism is a phenomenon with three dimensions. Neoliberalism is an ideology, a mode of governance, and a policy package.10 First, Steger and Roy define neoliberalism as an ideology because they regard ideologies as “systems of widely shared ideas and beliefs that are accepted as truth by significant groups in society.” Accordingly, ideologies are “indispensable cognitive maps” that guide human beings through complex political landscapes. Ideologies offer images of the world mapping the world as it is, but the images also suggest how the world ought to be. Thus, ideologies “organize their core ideas into truth-claims that encourage people to act in certain ways. These claims are assembled by codifiers of ideologies to legitimize certain political interests and to defend or challenge dominant political power structures.”11 Neoliberialism functions like an ideology by mapping people’s notions about the world in which they live. More specifically, Steger and Roy define the ideology of neoliberalism as an economic ideology. It presents “idealized images of a consumerist, free-market world” as indispensable for creating a better world. Neoliberalism as an economist ideology pervades the public discourse in many parts of the world. Its principles of free market capitalism 6  So, e.g., Kadri Aavik, Birgit Riegraf, and Blanka Nyklova, “The Neoliberal/ising University at the Intersection of Gender and Place,” Gender and Research 18.1 (2017): 6; Jeff Hearn, “Neoliberal Universities, Patriarchies, Masculinities and Myself: Trans-national Personal Reflections on and from the Global North,” in Gender in/and the Neoliberal University, 16–41. For Hearn’s definition of neoliberalism, see 18–21. Hearn lists several publications for further reading on the relationship between neoliberalism and the academy. The journal is available online at https://www.genderonline. cz/en/issue/42-volume-18-number-1-2017-gender-in-and-the-neoliberal-university-transnationalprocesses-and-localised-impacts, May 31, 2019. For a study of the intellectual history of neoliberalism, see Quinn Slobodian, Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2018). 7  Hearn, “Neoliberal Universities,” 19. 8  Manfred B. Steger and Ravi K. Ray, Neoliberalism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). The authors work in the field “Global Studies” with scholarly expertise in political and social theory, peace studies, international politics (Steger), and economic policy and public policy (Roy). 9  Ibid., 11. 10 Ibid.,11. 11  Ibid. All quotes in this paragraph are from this page.

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   203 that consists of global trade and financial markets, worldwide flows of goods, and services and labor are central everywhere.12 Global power elites play key roles in the pervasive presence of neoliberalism in the world. These elites are “codifiers of neoliberalism” and include “managers of executives of large transnational cooperations” as well as lobbyists, journalists, specialists in public relations, intellectuals, entertainers, politicians, and state bureaucrats.13 Second, according to Steger and Roy, neoliberalism is a mode of governance in line with Michel Foucault’s concept of “governmentalities.” This notion refers to “modes of governance based on particular premises, logics, and power relations.”14 Steger and Roy also explain that neoliberal governmentality is “rooted in entrepreneurial values such as competitiveness, self-interest, and decentralization. It celebrates individual empowerment and the devolution of central state power to smaller regulated units.”15 The focus on individualism and the rejection of the common good enacted by governmental power ensures that neoliberal individuals do not pursue the public good, justice, and welfare for all. Rather, they bring technologies from business and commerce into every other areas of society. Accordingly, the pursuit of profit becomes the main driving force also in government-run programs, such as social security and related social programs.16 The neoliberal mode of governance transfers the principles of the market, as practiced in the business and corporate world, to all the other spheres of society. They include healthcare and universities.17 One particular model of public administration, called the New Public Management (NPM), follows neoliberal practices from business companies. The NPM model focuses on leadership and measurable results. For instance, the NPM model has led to the relentless emphasis of learning outcomes in educational settings.18 In the NPM model the role of the state is reduced to controlling those outcomes. As a result, university teachers and professors are constantly required to document their work results with often very cumbersome and tedious computer reporting programs. Thus, when neoliberalism as a mode of governance moves into academia, the neoliberal university becomes part of what Michael Power calls “the audit society.”19 Third, according to Steger and Roy, neoliberalism is “a policy package” that consists of a set of policies. The policies include the deregulation of the economy, the liberalization of trade and industry, and the privatization of enterprises that have been traditionally owned and run by the government, often on the regional and municipal levels. When neoliberalism becomes a policy package, the policy results often include tax cuts for private businesses, corporations, and high-income earners. At the same time, neoliberal 12 Ibid.,11–12. 13  Ibid., 11. 14  Ibid., 12. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 17  The first process is often called “marketization” and the second process is called “management.” 18  For a detailed presentation of New Public Management, see Steger and Roy, Neoliberalism, 12–13. For references to works on “New Public Management” within the university, see Johan Östling, Humboldt and the Modern German University: An Intellectual History (Lund: Lund University Press, 2018), 211 n. 13. 19  Michael Power, The Audit Society: Rituals of Verification (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997). See also Sven Widmalm, “Kundskapssamhället,” in Det hotade universitetet, ed. Shirin Ahlbäck Öberg et al. (Stockholm: Dialogos, 2016), 31.

204   Hanna Stenström policies reduce welfare programs and social services, downsize the government, create hostility toward unions, and lead to the establishment of think tanks, as new political institutions and cultural organizations reproduce and promote neoliberalism.20 The three dimensions of neoliberalism as an ideology, a mode of governance, and a policy package are increasingly present in most institutions and organizations in European societies, including in institutions of higher education.

What is the Neoliberal University? Nowadays, the phrase of “the neoliberal university” is an established term, although it does not have a generally accepted definition.21 It can be used in the singular as a model for those universities that represent alternatives to traditional university models such as the Humboldt model for modern universities. The phrase “the neoliberal university” can also be used in the plural when it refers to actual universities. Kadri Aavik, Birgit Riegraf, and Blanka Nyklova define neoliberal universities in the following way when they explain: [Neoliberal universities] function according to market principles and a neoliberal logic by adopting new policies and regulations on national and transnational levels of decision-making. The administratively implemented reforms have also often been accompanied by a drive to change the self-perception and behaviour of individual academics and of academic communities, i.e. to change the very embodiment and performance of academic subjects. This has involved the introduction and implementation of market principles in higher education. In particular, the pressure comes from highlighting individual achievement and valuing competition between academics and between universities, while rejecting solidarity and collegiality as core values of academic work. The collective dimensions of human activity, such as research, are downplayed.22

The description of neoliberal universities as market-driven, individualistic, and highly competitive places fit all three dimensions of Roy’s and Steger’s definition of neoliberalism as an ideology, a mode of governance, and a policy package. It becomes obvious to globalized scholars that most neoliberal universities around the world operate in similar ways, although local varieties exist abundantly.23 The ideology of neoliberalism pervades public discourse in almost all spheres of society even though universities are still places where critical studies of ideologies can take place. Obviously, feminist scholarship, including feminist biblical scholarship, must play a significant role in such critical work. 20  Steger and Roy, Neoliberalism, 14. 21  See Aavik, Riegraf, and Nyklova, “Neolibera/lising,” 6. 22  Ibid., 2–3. 23  See, e.g., the case studies in Gender in/and the Neoliberal University. The cases relate to different countries, including the Czech Republic, South Africa, Estonia, Germany, Sweden, Finland, and the U.K.

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   205 The emergence of the neoliberal university has led to a new academic field, called “critical university studies.”24 Scholarship in this new field investigates the political economy of knowledge production within and outside the neoliberal university. As an interdisciplinary academic field, it asks what “the transformations in the governance of science means for academic research and knowledge production as well as teaching and instruction.”25 The influence of neoliberalism within universities has also led to research by geopolitically and academically differently located scholars who investigate the nature and purpose of universities and what the roles of academia are in today’s society. Usually, such scholarship regards neoliberalism as a threat to the most basic values of academic education and research.26 The proponents of critical university studies also consider their research as vitally important to democratic society. In some works criticizing the neoliberal university researchers define “the university as an autonomous world with its own logic and its own system of norms that are not the same as those of ideology, the market, or usefulness for the state.”27 Some thinkers find this notion of the university represented in the current models of higher education,28 as for instance in liberal-arts colleges in the U.S.A.29 or the Humboldt-university tradition in Germany.30 Other critics of the neoliberal university emphasize the vital functions of universities in democratic societies. Accordingly, many critics of the neoliberal university consider research in the humanities and the social sciences an indispensable self-reflection to make democratic governance structures successful and lasting.31 Yet most importantly, neoliberal modes of operation and organization of higher-education

24  See, e.g., the series “Critical University Studies” that is published by Palgrave Macmillan Publishing House featuring many important books on the topic: https://www.palgrave.com/gp/ series/14707. See also the following blog website on critical university studies: http://www. radicalteacher.net/criticaluniversitystudies/. See also Jeffrey J. Williams, “Deconstructing Academe: The Birth of Critical University Studies,” Chronicle of Higher Education (February 19, 2012): https://www. chronicle.com/article/An-Emerging-Field-Deconstructs/130791. 25  Aavik, Riegraf, and Nyklova, “Neolibera/lising,” 2. The editorial includes a valuable bibliography. 26  To take an example from my own country which has been important for my work with this essay, see Shirin Ahlbäck Öberg et al., Det hotade universitetet (Stockholm: Dialogos, 2016). The translation of the title into English is “The Endangered University.” For a debate in Germany that illustrates the complex situation, such as the history and ideals of the German universities beyond neoliberal influences, see Östling, Humboldt and the Modern University. References to the neoliberal situation at German universities appear throughout the book on pp. 95, 211, 220–21, 230, and 232. 27 Östling, Humboldt and the Modern University, 249. 28  The liberal arts model of the United States and the Humboldt tradition at German universities also appear in the discussion by Östling, Humboldt and the Modern University, 248. 29  For an influential example, see Martha C. Nussbaum, Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities (Princeton, NJ / Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2016). The Princeton University Press published the book already in 2010. 30 Östling, Humboldt and the Modern University, 248, discusses Humboldt and the Humboldt tradition within the German debate about universities as a defense to acquire “knowledge that goes beyond vocational programmes and instrumental usefulness” and of academic studies which “promotes civic and human development.” 31  Jonna Bornemark, Det omätbaras renässans: En uppgörelse med pedanternas herravälde (Stockholm: Volante, 2018), 273–4.

206   Hanna Stenström institutions are viewed as only one option among others in these studies. Alternative ways of researching and teaching emerge as viable ways of university life. Research in critical university studies raises two important points for feminist studies in general and feminist biblical studies in particular. First, scholars of critical university studies insist that the neoliberal university rejects “solidarity and collegiality as core values of academic work” and always downplays “the collective dimensions of human activity, such as research.”32 This point is significant because it pertains directly to feminist scholarship in any field, including feminist biblical studies. It challenges feminist biblical scholars to maintain and even to (re)-create genuinely collective scholarship that promotes collegiality and solidarity, including solidarity among women and others working for gender justice outside the walls of the neoliberal university. If neoliberalism promotes individuality and isolated forms of work, feminist scholarship ought to foster collaboration, connections, and the collegial spirit in research, writing, and teaching. Second, Aavik, Riegraf, and Nyklova highlight the self-disciplinary changes required by the neoliberal academic subject to succeed in the neoliberal university. They state: The administratively implemented reforms have also often been accompanied by a drive to change the self-perception and behaviour of individual academics and of academic communities, i.e. to change the very embodiment and performance of academic subjects.33

In other words, individual researchers are implicated in the operations of the neoliberal university. The sociologist Jeff Hearn further develops this idea when he connects the organizational changes of academia with the construction of the individual scholar. From a Foucauldian perspective, at stake is not only that individual scholars must adjust to precarious working conditions. They also must internalize the ideals of the neoliberal university and be formed by them on a deep level. They have to become neoliberal academic subjects.34 This assimilation constitutes a tremendous challenge to feminist biblical scholars because it raises the question about what kind of academic subjects feminist exegetes want to be. The question is whether neoliberalism changes feminists so much so that our feminism disappears as we become assimilated neoliberal subjects. Will our feminism become neoliberal and how can feminists resist without moving into intellectual and institutional isolation? In sum, the neoliberal university implements modes of governance and policy packages that create precarious working conditions for all scholars, except for those most 32  The journal, Gender in/and the Neoliberal University, maintains that feminist/gender perspectives ought to be integrated into critical university studies. In the included case studies, feminist/gender theories provide analytical tools for understanding various aspects of “the neoliberal university.” Several case studies also focus on the conditions of feminist/gender studies within neoliberal universities. In addition, the editorial comments indicate that the editors of the journal worked collectively on the theme issue, in contrast to the guiding principles of the neoliberal university. 33  Aavik, Riegraf, and Nyklova, “Neolibera/lising,” 6. 34  Hearn, “Neoliberal Universities,” 19–21.

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   207 assimilated to the demands of the neoliberal university. Feminist scholars, too, live in this conflict that places the values of the neoliberal university before the flourishing of the common good, human life, and society in general. Unsurprisingly, then, feminist research does not appear on the top of the neoliberal university agenda. The lack of appreciation and support for the humanities and even the social sciences includes feminist biblical studies. What are feminist Bible scholars going to do about this dire situation?

Feminist Biblical Scholarship and Neoliberalism in Exegetical Scholarship A word of caution: I am well aware that this section is written from my perspective as a feminist biblical scholar from the global North. It is likely that a feminist biblical scholar from the global South, who participates in church work toward social justice and perhaps supports poor women suffering from the consequences of neoliberal global capitalism, would offer a different analysis, perhaps including feminist interpretations of biblical texts on social justice. Yet I decided to examine several feminist publications in biblical studies that critically interrogate neoliberal tendencies and strategies in biblical scholarship. The publications indicate the increasing popularity among biblical scholars and lay readers to reference the Bible with neoliberal ideas in mind. This exegetical situation is relevant for religious institutions, culture, and society in Europe because it normalizes neoliberal thought. Several feminist investigations on neoliberal appropriations of the Bible stand out. One of the earliest inquiries comes from the feminist Hebrew Bible and Jewish studies scholar, Esther Fuchs. She observed a neoliberal turn in feminist biblical scholarship already in 2008.35 Exposing neoliberalism as an ideology in feminist biblical publications, Fuchs critically examines the neoliberal assumptions of several feminist studies on the Hebrew Bible. She claims that the interpretations advance neoliberal feminism even though the authors do not state so explicitly. Fuchs shows that well-known feminist Hebrew Bible scholars, such as Ilana Pardes, Susan Ackerman, and Tikva Frymer-Kensky rely on neoliberal strategies of interpretation. They focus on women’s experiences, thereby essentializing gender. Moreover, they do not challenge the academic framework within which historical reconstructions of women highlight women’s strength, power, autonomy, social status, and cultural contributions. Thus, they present the category of “woman” as a naturalized, biological category that regards gender as a stable and 35  Esther Fuchs, “Reclaiming the Hebrew Bible for Women: The Neoliberal Turn in Contemporary Feminist Scholarship,” Journal of the Feminist Study in Religion 24.2 (2008): 45–65. The essay is included in Esther Fuchs, Feminist Theory and the Bible: Interrogating the Sources (Feminist Studies and Sacred Texts; Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2017).

208   Hanna Stenström unchanging essence or even reality. Most importantly, neoliberal feminist exegetes assume the principles of Western and European liberalism and humanism which enables neoliberal feminist interpreters to separate power from knowledge. Their interpretations present themselves as innocent readings about women with the goal to hold up universal truth about women and men, or humanity in general. Fuchs asserts that these kinds of biblical readings seek mere inclusion into the exegetical status quo, as their authors present their interpretations as descriptive, objective, and value-neutral readings of the Bible. Simultaneously, Fuchs charges that neoliberal feminist exegetes omit any references to feminist genealogies of knowledge and feminist ways of knowing. They defer to the “fathers of the field” and disregard their own indebtedness to feminist mothers. Another examination on neoliberal tendencies in biblical interpretations comes from the feminist Hebrew Bible scholar, Susanne Scholz. In a book chapter, entitled “Essentializing ‘Woman’: Three Neoliberal Strategies in Christian Right’s Interpretations on Women in the Bible,”36 Scholz takes Fuchs’s essay as her point of departure for analyzing Christian Right readings on biblical women. She observes that “[a]s Christian Right interpreters have intensified their systematic exploration of the Bible, they have increasingly become interested in the study of biblical women.”37 Relying on the neoliberal strategies identified by Fuchs, Scholz analyzes popular and widely distributed Christian Right interpretations on biblical women, published in the United States. Scholz shows that Fuchs’s critique of feminist biblical scholarship as neoliberal appropriations also occurs in these popular treatises. Most importantly, the deconstruction of the neoliberal interpretations of biblical women demonstrates the fallacy of the common belief that Christian Right readings merely present literal, common sense, and straightforward exegesis of biblical texts. Thus, both feminist scholarly and Christian Right readings of the Bible endorse neoliberal ideology as natural, unchangeable, and omnipresent.38 In addition to investigating the influence of neoliberal ideology on Christian interpretations, Scholz also considers the consequences of neoliberal governmentalities and policies in queer and masculinity biblical studies.39 After mentioning briefly the well-known realities of budget cuts in colleges and universities as well as the difficult 36  Susanne Scholz, Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; London / New York, NY: T&T Clark Bloomsbury, 2017). 37  Ibid., 149. 38  Another feminist publication that includes a critical study of neoliberalism is Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, ed., Feminist Biblical Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement (The Bible and Women 9:1; Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2014). In the introduction to this volume, Schüssler Fiorenza includes a section on “Religious Symbol-Systems: Biblical Imagination and Neoliberal Globalization.” However, Schüssler Fiorenza merely mentions neoliberal globalization as a context for contemporary feminist biblical scholarship but does not further develop the issue. The chapter states on page 17 that feminist biblical scholarship can support either the forces of “economic and cultural global dehumanization” or global justice. In the same volume Susanne Scholz also draws attention to the marginalization of feminist biblical scholars and to Christian Right interpretations on biblical women. 39  Susanne Scholz, “Denaturalizing the Gender Binary: Queer and Masculinity Studies as Integral to Feminist Biblical Studies,” chap. in Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible, 127–48.

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   209 situations of the humanities in general, Scholz highlights the “ongoing marginalization of feminist biblical work in institutions of higher education.” She asserts that the neoliberal sidelining has dampened “the powerful energies that were set free in the 1970s.”40 She reminds readers that the neoliberal hegemony in global economies have affected institutions of higher education globally. In her view, this development has caused “considerable intellectual and economic difficulties for progressive academics”41 who pursue progressive research agendas, such as feminist biblical scholarship.42 In short, Scholz puts the neoliberal university, its mode of governance, and its policy package on the agenda of feminist, queer, and masculinity biblical studies. Yet another feminist Bible scholar deliberates on the impact of neoliberalism on feminist studies. The New Testament exegete, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, maintains that neoliberalism envisions a new world order on the national and international levels, characterized by inequality, competition, market discipline, law and order, and public austerity.43 To Schüssler Fiorenza, feminist biblical scholarship has its proper place at the intersection of scholarship, progressive (Christian) theologies of liberation, and movements for social justice that include gender justice. The renowned feminist Bible scholar maintains that feminist biblical scholarship is “a radical democratic critical discourse of conscientization, self-respect, and transformation.”44 Consequently, feminist biblical scholars must participate in movements for social justice.45 They need to critically interrogate neoliberal leanings in academia and society. They also ought to offer alternative feminist visions for theological and religious discourse as well as for human life on earth. More specifically, Schüssler Fiorenza draws attention to the consequences of neoliberalism in the academy. She refers to the particular problems of scholarly communication in neoliberal contexts in which publications constitute the most basic forms of scholarly exchange although publishing contract decisions are based more and more on the profit margins of publishers than on scholarly or pedagogical content. Accordingly, European publishers often ask scholars to pay for getting books and articles published. Books are getting so expensive that students cannot afford them and academic libraries need to constantly increase their acquisition budgets. Schüssler Fiorenza thus observes that the neoliberal impact on scholarly research, publishing, and teaching makes it increasingly difficult to create a “feminist culture of communication between the generations of feminist biblical scholars.”46 40  Susanne Scholz, “From the ‘Women’s Bible’ to the ‘Women’s Bible’: The History of Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible,” chap. in Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible, 40. 41 Ibid. 42  Ibid., 40–1. 43  Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, “Feminist Remappings in Times of Neoliberalism,” in The Bible and Feminism: Remapping the Field, ed. Yvonne Sherwood with the assistance of Anna Fisk (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 171. 44  Ibid., 170. 45  Ibid., 170–1. 46  Ibid., 175–7. See also the discussion by Yvonne Sherwood about the consequences of the neoliberal ideology on several contributors to her anthology; see Yvonne Sherwood, “Acknowledgments,” in Bible and Feminism, ed. Sherwood, ix (not paginated).

210   Hanna Stenström These relatively few currently existing references to the neoliberal impact on feminist biblical studies need to be further expanded. We need to explore the following issues that the current generations of feminist Bible scholars face: how do biblical texts, biblical motifs, and biblical themes appear in neoliberal settings today? How do neoliberals or their opponents use the Bible in political debates or for political gain? How is biblical scholarship recited or ignored in neoliberal contexts? Who is mentioned as authoritative for biblical meanings in those contexts, and why?47 Perhaps feminist studies on the reception history of the Bible will gain increasing significance and popularity, as contemporary culture represents a huge neoliberal arena of expressing and articulating biblical ideas in ever surprising ways and formats.48 In sum, feminist Bible scholars have begun studying the impact of neoliberalism on feminist biblical studies. Surely, feminist exegetes will have to move deeper into this area of investigation in the foreseeable future.

On the Future of European Feminist Biblical Studies in the Neoliberal Era Some final considerations about remedying the neoliberal conditions for European feminist Bible scholarship shall conclude this essay. As mentioned previously, several scholars have published their research in various fields on the neoliberal university and its consequences for feminist and gender studies. These works also consider the intellectual welfare of scholars who assert feminist research agendas in a system based on values in conflict to feminist values. These studies investigate neoliberal processes within different geopolitical contexts and combine them with personal reflections on the working conditions of feminist scholars in neoliberal universities. In my view, similar books and journal articles written by feminist biblical scholars would play an important role in understanding the challenges of neoliberalism and the neoliberal university for specifically feminist Bible scholars. Such research could be done within a collective process, in which scholars would interact with each other in researching and writing on the topic. The result would be anthologies characterized by collegiality and solidarity. These kinds of books would exemplify the kind of resistance needed to develop scholarly alternative practices and theories to the neoliberal 47  For a beginning conversation on these questions, see James Crossley, Jesus in an Age of Neoliberalism: Quests, Scholarship and Ideology (Durham, NC: Acumen, 2013); James Crossley, Cults, Martyrs and Good Samaritans: Religion in Contemporary English Political Discourse (London: Pluto, 2018); James Crossley, “The End of Reception History, a Grand Narrative for Biblical Studies and the Neoliberal Bible,” in Reception History and Biblical Studies: Theory and Practice, ed. Emma England and William John Lyons (Scriptural Traces: Critical Perspectives on the Reception and the Influence of the Bible 6; London: Bloomsbury, 2015), 45–59. 48  For such a study that, however, does not mention the concept of neoliberalism, see, e.g., Katie B. Edwards, Admen and Eve: The Bible in Contemporary Advertising (The Bible in the Modern World 48; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2012).

European Feminist Biblical Scholarship in the Neoliberal Era   211 ­ ni­ver­sity.49 Importantly, such work would need to be done in cooperation with feminist u and gender scholars from other academic disciplines to broaden the reach of everybody’s insights and readership. Several research topics come to mind. One research topic could investigate how the Bologna Process has shaped feminist biblical scholarship across several European countries. Since the Bologna Process includes countries with different university systems, a critical analysis of the Bologna Process would certainly lead to different evaluations from variously located European feminist Bible scholars. Different ideas for resisting neoliberalism in higher education might emerge in light of different European uni­ver­ sity systems. The aim would be the promotion of feminist scholarship and teaching to strengthen democracy and gender justice in society. Such interdisciplinary approaches to feminist biblical research by scholars who are located at European neoliberal universities would uncover the institutional and intellectual complexities of the different situations. Such studies would show how neoliberal forces in various university systems and societies interact with other factors that differ widely in Europe, such as the status of religion in society. For instance, the gains from localized investigations into particular geopolitical contexts becomes obvious in Scholz’s study of Christian Right interpretations of the Bible in the United States. Vander Stichele’s discussion on the gendering of New Testament Studies in the Netherlands clarifies the institutional situation of women’s and gender studies in theology departments related to the secularization process in the Netherlands, the market-driven business model practiced by Dutch universities, and the hostility of the so-called restoration movements in both Dutch Protestant and Catholic churches to feminist and gender studies.50 Many other localized studies are needed to gain detailed understanding about the specific circumstances in European universities. The publications by Scholz and Vander Stichele could serve as models for similar research projects that would examine the impact of neoliberalism on the academic field of biblical studies. Such studies might evoke questions about the role of feminist biblical scholarship in relation to the academy, religious organizations, and society. They would certainly illustrate that academic neoliberalism and conservative, even reactionary, movements in religious life pose considerable threats to feminist biblical scholarship in Europe and elsewhere. Yet the studies by Scholz and Vander Stichele also suggest that such research ought to be geopolitically specific. The neoliberal realities look differently in the United States where the Christian Right is an important political factor than in a secularized European country, such as the Netherlands. Still, it will be important for 49  For an example of such collective work, see Aavik, Riegraf, and Nyklova, “Neolibera/lising,” 3–6. 50  Caroline Vander Stichele, “Is Dona Quixote Fighting Windmills? Gendering New Testament Studies in the Netherlands.” lectio difficilior: European Electronic Journal for Feminist Exegesis (1/2013): http://www.lectio.unibe.ch/13_1/vander_stichele_caroline_is_dona_quixote_fighting_windmills.html. Her essay also illuminates the complex situation about the difficulties of, for instance, maintaining biblical studies as an academic discipline when departments of theology are redefined into departments of religious studies, or the fact that many Dutch exegetes still understand biblical scholarship as historical-critical work under the exclusion of feminist and gender hermeneutical perspectives.

212   Hanna Stenström feminist Bible scholars to look for commonalities while recognizing geopolitical, institutional, religious, cultural, and perhaps even political differences. As feminist Bible scholars, we ought to define our work in opposition to neoliberalism while we also recognize the global processes in which all feminist exegetes research, write, and teach. We ought to remember that proponents of neoliberalism often present neoliberalism as the only viable and productive option available today. They suggest that nobody can or should resist it. For instance, already the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher repeatedly said in the 1980s that “there is no alternative”51 and the Swedish people know the phrase, describing neoliberal politics in the 1990s, as “den enda vägen,” which in English means “the only way.”52 Feminist biblical scholarship thus ought to present alternative ways of interpreting the Bible and living in the world today. In conclusion, feminist biblical scholarship plays an important role in resisting neoliberal claims that there is no alternative to neoliberal modes of seeing the world. History shows that society changes constantly and change is the foundation of historical developments. Feminist research demonstrates that gender, too, is expressed differently in past and present societies. Feminist biblical scholars, thus, know that alternative modes of human life have always existed, and this neoliberal age is not an exception. We ought to refuse deterministic claims of neoliberalism and instead affirm the feminist conviction that alternative ways of thinking and living are possible through collective feminist work. European feminist Bible scholars need to build biblical research and teaching on this firm conviction, and resist neoliberal demands of our time.

Bibliography Aavik, Kadri, Birgit Riegraf, and Blanka Nyklova, eds. “Gender in/and the Neoliberal University: Transnational Processes and Localised Impacts.” Gender and Research 18.1 (2017): https://www.genderonline.cz/en/issue/42-volume-18-number-1-2017-gender-in-andthe-neoliberal-university-transnational-processes-and-localised-impacts. Lipton, Briony, and Elizabeth Mackinlay. We Only Talk Feminist Here: Feminist Academics, Voice and Agency in the Neoliberal University. Palgrave Studies in Gender and Education. Cham: Springer International, 2016. Nussbaum Martha C. Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities. Second ed. Princeton, NJ / Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2016. Östling, Johan. Humboldt and the Modern German University: An Intellectual History. Lund: Lund University Press, 2018. Available online at https://www.oapen.org/search?identifier=646121. Rottenberg, Catherine. The Rise of Neoliberal Feminism. Heretical Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Taylor, Yvette, and Kinneret Lahad, eds. Feeling Academic in the Neoliberal University: Feminist Flights, Fights and Failures. Palgrave Studies in Gender and Education. Cham: Springer International, 2018. Thwaites, Rachel, and Amy Pressland, eds. Being an Early Career Feminist Academic: Experiences and Challenges. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. 51  For a reference to the slogan, see Steger and Roy, Neoliberalism, 21. 52  Kjell Östberg and Jenny Andersson, Sveriges historia 1965–2012 (Stockholm: Norstedts, 2013), 374–97.

chapter 14

N eoliber a lism a n d Qu eer Th eory i n Biblica l R e a di ngs Teresa J. Hornsby

A direct, inextricable relationship exists between capitalism, the gender binary, and the sexualities of human beings. As a manifestation of Foucauldian “power,” capitalism creates every aspect of “what it means to be human.” In other words, each and every perception of what is “normal,” “appropriate,” “acceptable,” “perverse,” “bizarre,” or “fringe” is conjured up, sustained, and maintained through a deeply integrated economic system of merit that is always in flux. In the current economic system, a particularly nasty strain of neoliberalism, the essential ingredients for a robust capitalism are churned out at lightning speed: inequality, xenophobia, and a combative binary worldview. On the one hand, in some sectors, binaries are dissolving; for example, a heightened acceptance of trans people, interracial relationships, and healthcare and civil benefits for same-sex couples. On the other hand, an amplified and vitriolic backlash takes place against the same groups: “bathroom legislation” against trans people in the United States, courts granting the rights of Christians to discriminate against LGBT people, and TRAP laws impeding women from access to safe and legal abortion. What is happening is not so much a dissolution of binary thinking but a thickening of the demarcation between opposites. In other words, a middle position between the polar opposites of acceptance and exclusion has been erased. The following essay explains how neoliberal economics produces inequality and simultaneously weakens and bolsters a gendered binary. It also elaborates on the contributions of the Bible and the ways in which “theologies of suffering” support a neoliberal quest for submissive and suffering bodies. Special attention is given to several prophetic texts and Judges 7. The essay concludes with a reflection on biblical interpretation as a producer of submissive and dependent bodies in service to neoliberal concerns.

214   Teresa J. Hornsby

Neoliberalism and Neoliberal Capitalism The essence of “neoliberalism” as an ideology can be described as a utopic vision, one that is vastly different from neoliberal capitalism. As David Harvey writes, “We have to pay careful attention . . . to the tension between the theory of neoliberalism and the actual pragmatics of neoliberalism.”1 Its intent seems to be noble: the quest for truth, humanity, compassion, equality, justice, and liberty. Neoliberalist ideals move toward a full realization of “Truth” by seeking community consensus. Its limitless scope of social institutions renders it postmodern. It does not distinguish between the political, the economic, the social, or the religious. Perhaps the most articulate formation of neoliberalism would be found in Jürgen Habermas’s work on discourse ethics. In the Kantian chasm of “whence truth?” the absence of a cosmological source of values (“goodness,” “morality,” “virtues,” or “truth”) is filled with a system referred to as “communicative rationality.” Habermas posits that “truth” is something that can be found in communal collaboration. It is precisely the transitory nature of identity that rightly complicates (and sabotages) the merging of neoliberalism and economics. Neoliberal ideals target virtuous truths through an ephemeral coming together of fleeting identities, with a dismissal of an ontological mover or a central authority. At the same time neoliberal capitalists seek an unfettered system that is void of government interference to generate profit. This form of capitalism emphasizes the rights of property owners, unfettered trade, and free enterprise, along with the dogma that a free market is self-regulatory, replacing a state regulator with the property owner or CEO. The emphasis is neoliberal only in its refusal to recognize the state as a regulator, and in its commandeering of a postmodernist rejection of essentialist categories of social strata. In a neoliberal capitalist venture the ideal is profit. Feminist historian Johanna Oksala explains this dynamic in this statement:   [Neoliberalism] is not reducible to a set of economic policies such as limiting the regulation of capital, maximizing corporate profits, and dismantling the welfare state. As a form of governmentality neoliberalism extends beyond economic policy, or even the economic domain as traditionally conceived. A fundamental feature of neoliberal governmentality is not just the eradication of market regulation, for example, but the eradication of the border between the social and the economic: market rationality—cost-benefit calculation—must be disseminated to all institutions and social practices.2

1  David Harvey, A Brief Introduction to Neoliberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 21. 2  Johanna Oksala, “Feminism and Neoliberal Governmentality,” Foucault Studies 16 (2013): 32–53, 34.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   215 In neoliberalism, the individual should have absolute freedom, and the concept of “freedom” is crucial. Similarly, Harvey summarizes Karl Polanyi when he reminds his readers that freedom, like everything else, is complex and without assigned value; along with “good” freedoms one must accept the “bad” ones as well: In a complex society . . . the meaning of freedom becomes as contradictory and as fraught as its incitements to action are compelling. There are [according to Polanyi] two kinds of freedom, one good, the other bad. Among the latter he listed “the freedom to exploit one’s fellows, or the freedom to make inordinate gains without commensurable service to the community, the freedom to keep technological inventions from being used for public benefit, or the freedom to profit from public calamities secretly engineered for private advantage.”3

This final “bad” freedom is indeed ominous. Harvey, quoting Polyani, then states: “The market economy in which these freedoms throve also produced freedoms we prize highly. Freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, freedom of meeting, freedom of association, freedom to choose one’s own job.” While we may “cherish these freedoms for their own sake” they were to a large extent “by-products of the same economy that was also responsible for the evil freedoms.”4

In other words, the cherished freedoms are folded into the essentials of neoliberal economics; they consist of free enterprise and private property. State regulatory measures and those who back them are proclaimed to be against freedom, liberty, and justice. Those who decry the inevitable circumstances of the “bad” freedoms are branded as traitors, terrorists, and “queer.” Inequalities are not merely tolerated but required for the very existence of neoliberal capitalism. The basic idea is this: regardless of the goods or modes of production, such as agricultural, industrial, or electronic, competition forms the bedrock of capitalism which, in turn, assumes inequality. Expanding on this principle in his lectures at the College de France, Michel Foucault explains that competition is not something that happens “naturally.” It must be cultivated and nurtured to maturity to assure a successful and thriving economy.5 Thus, in a neoliberal capitalist system, any stop-gap regulations put into place by social, governmental, or moral institutions to level the playing field are seen as threatening to the greater good, as determined by neoliberal capitalist mores. In short, the “bad” freedoms are not by-products of an effective and healthy neoliberal economy; they are necessary. In light of this, neoliberal capitalism produces and sustains inequalities, hierarchies, and binary oppositions. Yet it also relies upon an ideology of decentralization. It wants decentralized communication for unencumbered flow so that corporations enjoy the freedoms that have been traditionally reserved for individuals. It ensures that “identities” 3 Harvey, A Brief Introduction, 36. 4 Ibid. 5  Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolitics. Lectures at the Collège de France 1978–79 (ed. Michel Senellart; Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan, 2008), 243–5.

216   Teresa J. Hornsby become vague and ambiguous. This ambiguity, in turn, creates an oddity: while binaries must remain strong for capitalism to work, neoliberalism needs ambiguous identities and blurred boundaries to move seamlessly between the social and private spheres, between personal and private, between corporate and individual, and of course, between right and wrong. As one might suspect, feminist critics push back on the “postmodern” bent of neoliberalism as a dissolution of demarcation. As Nancy Fraser and Hester Eisenstein articulate so well, neoliberalism and postmodernism render all forms of social protest ineffective. Without an identity, how do under-represented groups organize? In other words, how does one participate in identity politics if there is no identity? Oksala articulates this dilemma when she states: Hester Eisenstein for example, has argued that the postmodern turn in women’s studies scholarship in the 1980s, with its emphasis on discourse and its distrust of grand narratives, undermined a systematic analysis of the capitalist system. The contemporaneous global rise of neoliberalism as the leading political and economic paradigm implies that feminism must now turn away from poststructuralist and postmodern analyses that focus on individual acts of resistance and back toward a structural analysis of global capitalism.6

The problem is that neoliberal thought does not allow for stable identities. Its ideas acquiesce to the denial of personal and social distinctions, and seek solidarity through common oppressions, interests, or benefits. However fleeting, neoliberal thought reinscribes the particulars that render some bodies inferior. For neoliberal power to thrive, it must dissolve individual identities, by appealing to broader and more abstract categories, such as “American” or “Christian” or “the middle class.” Furthermore, it must strengthen, to the point of being indestructible, the bedrock binary of “us” versus “them.” Binaries, always and no matter the pair, are gendered and hierarchical. The lesser is always coded feminine. The gender binary is the foundation to all other binaries, and hence, to everything. Simply put, the very existence of capitalism rests upon the creation and the preservation of the gender binary. Neoliberal capitalism is unique because of the way that the capital is produced, as opposed to how change is driven by producing capital.7 It is neither a new capitalism nor a “post capitalism.” Rather, at its core capitalism is a static concept. It must produce profit and is only dynamic in how and why it produces profit. The distinctiveness of neoliberal capitalism is its exploitation of human beings, which produce enormous profits. The less companies spend on labor costs, the higher their profit margin. While there are arguably more humane and moral ways of creating profit and streamlining labor costs, many transnational manufacturers know that they can pay extremely low wages with no fringe benefits to “particular types” of people. Historically, these people were mainly women, 6  Oksala, “Feminism and Neoliberal Governmentality,” 33. 7 Harvey, A Brief Introduction, vii.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   217 peoples of the southern hemisphere, and/or non-white individuals, although fluctuation exists that depends on extenuating circumstances, such as class stratification, religious affiliations, or ethnicity. This type of capitalism requires the covert production of people whom the mainstream considers as “other.” In other words, the perception of otherness must be both external and internal. Individuals must accept that their value is no more than what the status quo deems it to be.8 Thus, the dominant narrative defines those who are not “normal” as the “abnormal” or “queer.” In turn, those people must accept and even desire this social status. In the past two centuries, capitalism has changed; industrialized cultures have experienced an acceleration of what Harvey refers to as the “compression of space and time.”9 The change is due to a radical shift from the maximum speed of a horse-drawn carriage and wind-driven ships to the eight-hundred-mph thrust of the modern jet and instantaneous appearances made possible by the microchip and the internet. The development of electronic commerce is a manifestation of postmodern capitalism; a capitalism borne of human experiences in a compressed space and time. One stark way that postmodern capitalism differs from an industrial-based, or Fordian, capitalism is that, the latter system is not dependent on a manufacture of “real” commodities; the financial system rests on the production of non-tangibles. We are experiencing a Baudrillardian production of signs–images rather than commodities.10 Harvey explains: The interweaving of simulacra in daily life brings together different worlds (of commodities) in the same space and time. But it does so in such a way as to conceal almost perfectly any trace of origin, of the labour processes that produced them, or of the social relations implicated in their production. The simulacra can in turn become the reality.11

Not only does neoliberal capitalism produce invisible commodities, it hides effectively the labor processes that are necessary to produce them. This radical shift in constructed desire accompanies the turn to a postmodern or simulacra capitalism. Rosemary Hennessy recognizes this fact when she comments: [T]he dominant discourses of sexual identity in over industrialized sectors, spun across national lines through media and travel industries, seem to be changing, albeit in uneven ways. . . . The network of equations among sex, gender, sexual practice, and desire on which normative heterosexuality as a matrix of intelligibility came to depend under Fordism is being disrupted.12

8  For an accurate and more complex description of neoliberal capitalism, see Rosemary Hennessy, Profit and Pleasure: Sexual Identities in Late Capitalism (New York, NY: Routledge, 2000), 74–8. Marcella Althaus-Reid also makes clear the relationships between capitalism and theology in the production of sexualities; see her Indecent Theology (New York, NY: Routledge, 2000). 9 Harvey, A Brief Introduction, 241. 10  Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1995). 11 Harvey, A Brief Introduction, 300. 12 Hennessy, Profit and Pleasure, 107.

218   Teresa J. Hornsby As Hennessy infers, normative heterosexuality, the assumed and prescribed way of life in Western post-industrial societies, has increasingly been challenged and expanded to include various and diverse forms of sexual practices. As electronic commerce becomes principal within postmodern capitalism, power no longer needs the countless bodies that industrial capitalism did in the production of physical commodities. In this shift to the production of “simulacra,” power needs subservient bodies that work independently and without external supervision. Theoretically, for power to police these new bodies, it must produce different sexual and gender normatives. Compulsory heterosexuality produces those physical bodies. Yet, as the needs of power in capitalism change, as populations grow and mix, and as technology reduces the need for sexual reproduction, greater submission to power becomes necessary. In other words, fewer bodies are needed, but those bodies must serve selflessly and partly independent of external regulation because commerce no longer takes place wholly in the public sphere. Bodies must have a heightened and internalized “will to submit.” Thus, the production of a compulsory heterosexuality becomes less important. This shift in capitalism, Harvey’s “postmodern condition,” rivals the revolutionary global changes of technologies during previous centuries, including linguistic, agricultural, industrial, and nuclear paradigms. Each of these revolutions produced varying constructions of normative desire. For example, when power was more centralized and concentrated, as it was during the industrial era, the boundaries defining normative sexuality were more tightly drawn. That particular construction of desire which was necessary for the rise of post-war and pre-internet monopolistic and colonial capitalism should become rare and perhaps even obsolete because heteronormative desire is no longer essential in the production of capital. During this shift, diverse sexualities and genders are increasingly normalized and accepted in society. As the need for definite sexualities and genders becomes less important for the needs of capitalism, gender fluidity and submission move to the center. Hennessy writes: The discrete asymmetrical opposition between male and female is being thrown into question, pressuring the imaginary logic of opposites and sex-gender equations that the prevailing heterogender system once relied on. In the media images generated in overdeveloped capitalist centers especially, more permeable, fluid, ambiguously coded sexual identities are allowed, even promoted.13 Hennessy notes here that the gender binary is relaxed if it is not needed for profit. She also observes that neoliberal capitalism produces bodies congruent with the qualities needed for middle-class professional service workers “who need to be able to carry out multistep operations, manipulate abstract symbols, command the flow of information, and remain flexible enough to recognize new paradigms. Their work requires new affective and physical responses: habitual mobility, adaptability in

13 Ibid.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   219 every undertaking, the ability to navigate among possible alternatives and spaces, and a cultivation of ambivalence as a structure of feeling.”14

Hennessy makes clear the specific qualifications that neoliberal capitalism needs in exploitable bodies. Further Hennessy rightly recognizes that the economic system under neoliberalism produces the types of bodies it needs to thrive. The example of serv­ice workers mirrors the need for self-discipline and submissiveness of workers such as telecommuters. Neoliberal capitalism needs fewer physical bodies and more exploitable and subservient bodies than industrial capitalism. Yet, neoliberal capitalism relies upon a strong hierarchical binary, and the bedrock of any binary is gender. At first glance, there appears to be a contradiction in that neoliberal capitalism does not only survive but thrives in the midst of blurred and even dissolving gender boundaries. But if one takes seriously Judith Butler’s claim that the gender binary preexists (and produces) physically gendered bodies, it is clear that what is happening is the perpetual and covert production of the gender binary apart from its connection to a physical body.15 This irony (that the gender binary is strengthened precisely at the moment that sexualities become less defined) demonstrates that the gender binary does not need physical bodies to flourish. The following analysis indicates that biblical interpreters contribute to this ongoing neoliberal production of the gender binary.

About Neoliberal Contributions to Theologies of Suffering, Submission, and Redemption The interpretation history that I summarize below reflects a core ideology that values a redemption dependent upon suffering, submission, and vulnerable exposure. As I survey various exegetical conclusions that touch on the notions of suffering and submission, it will be clear how the Bible and its interpreters endorse in complex ways neoliberal economic agendas. They nurture the ideals of suffering, submission, and redemption that are required in the neoliberal age. At first glance, a heightened production of queer bodies may seem like a “good” thing. Fewer boundaries produce blurred identities, broadening the possibility for less he­gem­ony and binary opposition. For instance, Marcella Althaus-Reid argues that Christianity needs 14  Rosemary Hennessy, Profit and Pleasure: Sexual Identities in Late Capitalism (New York, NY: Routledge, 2000), 108. 15  Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York, NY: Routledge Press, 1990), 135–41.

220   Teresa J. Hornsby an indecent rather than a heteronormative theology to serve the needs of all people. By “indecent theology,” she refers to: Theologians who come out in their pursuit of honesty and engagement with the real and . . . grab a blouse and a lipstick and per/vert the normative socio/theological script, unveil obscenity and are able to see, from sexual stories at the bottom of Rubin’s sexual pyramid, tales of God and criticism of political systems.16

She claims that the experiences of those sexualities “at the bottom of Rubin’s sexual pyramid” are necessary to forge a “real” relationship with the divine, “an encounter to be found at the crossroads of desire, when one dares to leave the ideological order of the heterosexual pervasive normative.”17 While Althaus-Reid sees the inclusion of non-heteronormative or queer sexualities into central theological discourse as necessary and thus as a positive move forward in dismantling world-wide oppression, I propose that this theoretical inclusion of “indecency” is neoliberal capitalism’s use of theology to construct the types of sexual/economic subjects it requires. Biblical interpretation consistently takes a leading role in constructing subservient bodies, normative desires borne of submissive tendencies. Indeed, a submissive impulse lies at the heart of contemporary theologies that emphasize idealized suffering, willful self-sacrifice, glorified humiliation, and romanticized slavery. A look at recent interpretations of selected Hebrew Bible texts reveals a heightened sense of the Freudian “moral masochism” and its collusion in the production of normative sexual desires. In the Freudian sense, then, to be an ideal devotee means to take on a passive and culturally defined “feminine” role and to desire to take on whatever “our Father, who is in heaven” dishes out. That human beings become feminized in relation to God the Father in scripture is not new. The prophets see the men of Israel as God’s wife and beloved, the ekklesia is Jesus’ beloved, and the “elect men” in Revelation are the brides of Christ.18 Neoliberal subjectivities require that one must be eager to submit, seeking and accepting whatever may come. The following sections present how biblical exegetes assist in the production of ideal neoliberal devotees. Their focus on the idea of the suffering serv­ant in Isaiah 53, the translation of the Hebrew verbs of ‘innah and galah, and the notion of “exile” in the Book of Ezekiel exposes the close relationship between unconsciously held assumptions of a neoliberal capitalist ideology and theologies of suffering, submission, and redemption.

About Suffering, Submission, and Redemption in Prophetic Texts Biblical exegetes, whether they are Jewish or Christian, advance neoliberal capitalist assumptions in their readings of the Bible when the topic engages issues of suffering, submission, and redemption. Mordecai Schreiber’s understanding of Jesus’ crucifixion 16 Althaus-Reid, Indecent Theology, 199. 17  Ibid., 200. 18  Tina Pippen has an insightful article on this issue entitled, “The Joy of (Apocalyptic) Sex,” in Gender and Apocalyptic Desire, ed. Lee Quinby and Brenda Brasher (London: Equinox, 2006).

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   221 by reading it through Isaiah 53 is a case in point. Rather than focus on Jesus as apocalyptic teacher, Jesus as healer, Jesus as social critic, or Jesus as political revolutionary, the torturous crucifixion of Jesus has become central. Subservience and submissiveness, personified as the beaten, humble slave, are images that contemporary scholars, like Schreiber, often emphasize. Christians are called to mimic Jesus’ tragic end and to emulate Isaiah’s servant. When Schreiber reads Isaiah 53, he suggests that Jesus himself mimics Isaiah’s “suffering servant,” whom Schreiber believes to be the prophet Jeremiah. Schreiber writes: A careful reading of the Gospels shows that Jesus planned his martyrdom with Jeremiah in mind, using Isaiah Chapter 53—which he knew full well was about Jeremiah—as his guide. And the way he kept planning everything that was about to happen to him, step by step, day by day, as he does, for example in the story of the Last Supper and its aftermath, is a clear indication that he used a guide.19

For Schreiber, the essence of redemption is suffering; it is plausible yet sobering to think, as Schreiber does, that the theological ideas of salvation and Christian atonement are rooted in the suffering of a single Hebrew prophet, Jeremiah. One might also observe that much of the soteriology and theodicy of the Hebrew Bible, with the exception of Job and Qoheleth, rests upon finding redemption in the suffering of Israel, a redemption that requires submission to God. Other exegetical observations further expose the tendency in biblical scholarship to praise submission and suffering as ideal postures. For instance, the pi’el verb ‘innah illuminates this dynamic. In Hebrew, its meaning is often traditionally rendered into English as “to submit” or “to humble oneself ” (e.g., Gen. 16:9; Exod. 32:18; 2 Sam. 22:45; Isa. 53:4), but the translation of this term is complex. For example, in Judg. 19:24, the verb is used to describe the proposed rape of a householder’s daughters and Levite’s wife by an angry mob. The man says: “Here are my virgin daughter and his concubine; let me bring them out now. Ravish (‘innah) them and do whatever you want to them” (NRSV). The pi’el is also used later in the story, when the Levite recounts the gang rape to the council: “The lords of Gibeah rose up against me, and surrounded the house at night. They intended to kill me, and they raped (‘innah) my concubine until she died” (Judg. 20:5, NRSV). The verb, ‘innah, also appears in the description of the rape of Tamar in 2 Sam. 13:14, 22, and 32, where it is translated as to force (as to rape). How should we understand this dual use of ‘innah that simultaneously connotes humble submission and rape? When one considers the work of Mary Douglas and then observes the nearly identical ways in which the prophet Ezekiel uses the verb ‘galah, the nuances between “to humble oneself ” and “to be forcefully penetrated” become less subtle. In light of the work of Douglas, the fact that the acts of humbling oneself and ­submitting oneself to power are conflated with the reality of rape is not at all unexpected. Douglas maintains that the Israelites understood themselves to be one body. By 19  Mordecai Schreiber, “The Real ‘Suffering Servant’: Decoding a Controversial Passage in the Bible,” Jewish Bible Quarterly 37.1 (January–March 2009): 35–44.

222   Teresa J. Hornsby r­ egulating the orifices (mouth and genitals) and the borders (the skin) of the Israelite body, the Israelites were, in fact, fortifying potential points of community vulnerability. The implication of such concentrated regulation is that any infraction of laws governing the body, a symbolic microcosm of the Israelite world, opens up the entire community to potential destruction. The biblical prophets, for instance, understood the invasion, destruction, and forced exile of Israel (and Judah) to be consequences of neglected and eroded boundaries. Thus, to Douglas, the physical body is a microcosm of any bounded system. In other words, when the body submits, it must accept the consequence of the submission. The body is left vulnerable and open to “good” things, such as blessings from God, a loving embrace between God the husband and Israel the wife. But as Harvey warned above, with “good” freedoms come “bad” freedoms. As the body submits itself for God’s blessings, it is left open to “bad” things, such as the possibility of violent penetration. We see the same open-ended connotations in Ezekiel’s use of the root galah. The root appears in different grammatical forms as verbs and nouns, such as “to be naked” (e.g., Gen. 9.21); “to strip naked” (e.g., Ezek. 16.36); “a revelation of God” (e.g., 1 Sam. 2.27; 3.7; 3.21); “captivity” (e.g., Judges 18.30); exile (2 Sam. 15.19); or “a captive” (e.g., Jer. 39.9). The BDB lists the root’s primary meanings in the qal as “to uncover, to remove, to become clear, to reveal oneself, to become naked, to go forth, to emigrate.”20 Ezekiel’s use of galah is broad. He prefers the almost inexhaustible connotations of the root. As readers, we hold on to bits and pieces of meaning without understanding that each occurrence should evoke every possible meaning at once. Yet, interpreters have often been highly selective. For instance, Herbert Haag recognizes only the “godly meaning,” which he translates as “revelation.”21 He explains: The root meaning of glh is undoubtedly “to unhide” or “disclose,” thus to make free and visible that which, hidden and closed, is bound and concealed. Here, the image-laden language in the Hebraic goes in two directions. It can remain a concealed thing to people because it is itself concealed [by some entity], or because the human ear and eye is bound [in or by some entity] and therefore cannot apprehend its object.22

According to Haag, the root of galah always refers to an act of uncovering something, to show something that was previously hidden. In contrast to this limited view of galah, Resa Levitt Kohn notices that the phrase galah ‘ervah, “uncover nakedness,” occurs twenty-four times in the Hebrew Bible. Seventeen times it appears in the sexual codes in the book of Leviticus and five times in Ezekiel 16; 22; 23. Kohn looks only at the

20  Frances Brown, S. R. Driver, Charles A. Briggs, James Strong, and Wilhelm Gesenius, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1996), 162–3. 21  Herbert Haag, “Offenbaren in der hebräischen Bibel,” Theologische Zeitschrift 16 (1960): 251–8. Thanks to Prof. John Taylor, formerly of Drury University, for his translation of this article. 22 Ibid.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   223 sexual connotations of galah while ignoring Haag’s preference for the root’s more metaphorical meaning. While both scholars write about the same root, Haag focusing on the theological and Kohn on the sexual connotations, neither of them recognizes the extensive range of meaning or the ambiguity of galah. A third option, represented by Hans-Jürgen Zobel, synthesizes the socio-political and sexual aspects of the root, claiming that it is related to the Ugaritic root gly. This is a verb of motion in the sense of “to enter” and similar to the Phoenician root “to reveal, to uncover.” Zobel emphasizes the linguistic connection of galah between “uncovering the land” and exile. In his interpretation the land is revealed and thus open to entering in the sense of geopolitical penetration. He emphasizes that the notion of “entering” is a common euphemism for sexual intercourse in the Hebrew Bible, and so the phrase galah ‘ervah in Ezek. 16:36.37; 22:10 “means either ‘to commit fornication’ . . . or ‘to rape.’ ”23 In Zobel’s reading, exile is both a consequence and a synonym of rape and fornication. The relationship between the body, the land, and sexual penetration is the prerequisite for understanding the meaning of exile in Ezekiel. Still, according to Zobel the text’s theological meaning suggests that God is present and offers redemption. In this reading, then, Ezekiel constructs exile with the help of divergent abstractions of the phrase galah ‘ervah. In other words, Zobel ties together the notions of submission, rape, and suffering with a revelatory, possibly redemptive encounter with God. A closer look at Ezekiel’s use of galah ‘ervah will make these intersections more apparent. Although galah appears 190 times in the Hebrew Bible, the verb is used seventeen times in Leviticus and fourteen times in Ezekiel 16–23. In Leviticus, the verb only appears in the sexual codes. In addition, if the Levitical codes define social boundaries as physical boundaries, as many scholars claim, readers should be thinking about nasty sex when Ezekiel uses P’s terminology in chapters 16 and 23. As the priests in Leviticus tell us what not to do lest we dissolve all of our boundaries and all hell breaks loose, Ezekiel shows us what happened and that, indeed, all hell did break loose. When corporeal boundaries become blurred, to quote Leviticus and Ezekiel, it is an abomination. Ezekiel continues to use the verb galah to connect the condition of being exiled to exposed nakedness and violent penetration. Ezekiel 16 begins with the image of a bastard baby left vulnerable in a field.24 As the baby grows her bosoms, becomes beautiful, naked, and confused, God “reveals” himself to her. He adorns her with gifts, luxuries, necessities, and she is not grateful. She “opens herself ” to everyone else: to Egyptians with large penises, to Assyrians, and to Chaldeans. Those knowing about Leviticus 18 and 20 know that this “opening” is an abomination. In Ezek. 16:36.37 the root galah appears in the following sequence: God tells the woman Jerusalem that he will “strip her

23  Hans-Jürgen Zobel, “galah,” in Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, ed. G. Johannes Botterweck, Helmer Ringgren (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1977), 476–88. 24  So much has been written on this passage and Ezekiel 23 that I do not reinterpret them entirely. I focus only on those parts containing galah.

224   Teresa J. Hornsby naked” because she has “exposed her naked body.” The description continues with the dominant theme of her being naked and exposed (see vv. 37–52). Ezekiel uses galah again in 21:24 to connect the “uncovering of nakedness” with her being “taken by force” by the enemy. He makes this connection between nakedness and exile even more explicit in 22:10, listing the “abominations” from Leviticus 18 in order. They include the uncovering of a father’s nakedness, having sex with menstruating women, and having sex with neighbors’ wives, daughters-in-law, and sisters. Leviticus informs Ezekiel’s readers that “the land will spit them out” and they will “be cut off from the people” (v. 29) if they do these abominations. There is nothing new in this thesis that Ezekiel and other prophets contend that Jerusalem fell and its inhabitants were exiled because of various adulterous/idolatrous abominations. What we have missed, however, is that the verb galah not only connects the exile to exposed nakedness and penetration, it becomes the remedy and the means through which Ezekiel restores the people to God. The interpretation history of ‘innah and of galah reflects a core ideology exhumed for theological discourse in the Hebrew Bible. It embraces redemption, as dependent upon suffering, submission, and vulnerable (even violent) exposure. In short, the Bible and its interpreters endorse, in complicated ways, the neoliberal economic agenda. They nurture the ideals of suffering, submission, and redemption that are required in the neoliberal age.

About Suffering, Submission, and Redemption in Judges 7 and Job The neoliberal accommodation of biblical interpretation also endorses highly problematic ideas about redemption that concretizes the necessity of submission to power. The story of Gideon illustrates the glaring and constant exegetical invitations to surrendering identity and autonomy in exchange for security. Gideon, the youngest son of the weakest tribe, is commissioned by “an angel of YHWH” (6:11) to lead Israel and destroy the Midianites. Gideon, who is commanded to perform a series of tests, makes sacrifices to Israel’s god (YHWH), destroys the altars of Baal, and builds an altar to YHWH. Gideon also tries to verify that it is indeed this god giving these orders. Thus, Gideon requests a wet piece of wool and then a dry piece of wool (6:36–40). God passes the test and then realizes that Gideon has too many warriors. Israel’s god fears that “Israel would take the credit away from me, saying, ‘My own hand has delivered me’ ” (7:2). Gideon reduces his soldiers from 32,000 to 10,000 men by allowing those who are afraid to go home (7:3). Since there are still too many, Gideon decides that those three hundred soldiers prostrating themselves and lapping water like a dog stay on (7:6) whereas those soldiers kneeling and drinking from their hands (7:7) go home. Predictably, Bible commentators accommodate neoliberalist concerns when they compel readers to recognize personal property, loyalty, bravery, and submission as central to why and how the three hundred

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   225 remaining soldiers were chosen. For example, commentators wonder about the distinction between soldiers drinking like “dog lappers” or drinking like “palm drinkers.” Jack Sasson’s interpretation illustrates Gideon’s compliance with the neoliberal principles of bravery and submission: I am presuming that the instrument for drinking was not at stake, but the positioning was. Especially when on the run, dogs remain on all fours when lowering their tongues into the water. So, men who crouched before scooping water were to be differentiated from those who fell to their knees when doing the same.25

Sasson does not explain why he thinks God chooses men who crouch like dogs, but his explanation implies that the prostrated or crouched body is preferable to kneeling men. Thus, in his view, neither position indicates weakness, as articulated by Josephus in Ant. 5.216, nor strength, as articulated by Field Marshall Lord Wavell.26 Does crouching indicate an eagerness to pounce? Does it indicate subservience to power? Is it indicative of unquenchable thirst or the bestial instinct of survival? The mere fact that commentators pose these questions shows a neoliberal ideology is at work. It bolsters the hierarchal dualisms of weak and strong, courageous and cowardly, or powerful and subservient. Interestingly, Aaron Hornkohl, suggests that a binary of either/or does not exist in Judg. 7:6.27 According to Hornkohl, there is no binary opposition in the text; rather a binary is produced in the text’s reception. In his view, those who “lap as a dog laps” and “everyone who crouches on his knees to drink” belong to the same group. He thus translates verse 5: “Everyone who laps with his tongue from the water as the dog laps, that is to say, everyone who crouches on his knees to drink.”28 All the other warriors were sent home, except for three hundred soldiers. In Judg. 7:2, God intends to reduce the number of soldiers so that the defeat of the Midianites would be a clear miracle, wrought by God’s hand. In other words, the men were chosen by God, not for their skills, merit, bravery, or will, but simply because they belonged to the unit with the smaller number. Read in this fashion, the narrative about the small size of Gideon’s army teaches that power and security rest upon the submission to a sovereign entity, God. In short, biblical exegetes have little trouble linking the biblical story with neoliberal notions of security in exchange for submission. Many scholarly discussions about biblical theology and theodicy insinuate that success is based on merit and deservedness, whereas evil results from disobedience. The message is that God blesses those who submit and punishes those who do not. This idea also arises in the book of Job, which is often held up as refuting any meritocratic system, such as in Job 11:14–15.17: 25  Jack Sasson, Judges 1–12: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014), 352. 26  Cited by Abraham Malamat, “The War of Gideon and Midian: A Military Approach,” Palestinian Exploration Quarterly 85 (1953): 62–3. 27  Aaron Hornkohl, “Resolving the Crux of Judges 7:5b-7,” Hebrew Studies 50 (2009), 67–84. 28  Ibid., 79.

226   Teresa J. Hornsby Think now, who that was innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright cut off? As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same (Job 4:7–8). If iniquity is in your hand, put it far away, do not let wickedness reside in your tents. Surely then you will lift up your face without blemish; you will be secure, and will not fear. . . . Your life will be brighter than the noonday.

That the Bible justifies meritocracy and a theology that lays the groundwork for base capitalism is not a new observation. Max Weber describes it quite succinctly when he classifies Protestant theology as the foundation for capitalism.29 He explains that Protestant theology defines work as a spiritual calling and gives the institutional church the authority to define how people ought to spend the earnings from their work. Weber also recognizes that pre-industrial and industrial capitalism create the fundamental forces for shaping everything in society, including one’s worldviews, the divisions of labor, or gender norms. Since people adhered to these forces, they continuously create and recreate the same hierarchical conditions locking themselves into a reality that Weber terms as “the Iron Cage.” He explains it in this way: The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; we are forced to do so. For when asceticism was carried out of monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate worldly morality, it did its part in building the tremendous cosmos of the modern economic order. This order is now bound to the technical and economic conditions of machine production which today determine the lives of all the individuals who are born into this mechanism, not only those directly concerned with economic acquisition, with irresistible force. Perhaps it will so determine them until the last ton of fossilized coal is burnt. In Baxter’s view the care for external goods should only lie on the shoulders of the “saint like a light cloak, which can be thrown aside at any moment.” But fate decreed that the cloak should become an iron cage.30

In other words, people are both the creators and the creations of that which holds them bound, namely commodities. Since the neoliberal commodities have changed, we seek more than compensation. For us, the ultimate prize is security, so the illusion of security holds us captive today. Thus, neoliberal exegetes emphasize that even in the book of Job, redemption does not consist in restoring Job’s “things.” Rather, the final sign of his redemption is that he will be secure again: “Surely then you will lift up your face without blemish; you will be secure, and will not fear” (11:15, NRSV). The same sentiment appears in the Pentateuch. There, the prize is not the land and all its blessings but the promise that the people live safely in the land again (Lev. 25:18.19; Lev. 26:5; Deut. 12:10; 33:12; and 33:28). In sum, suffering, humiliation, and the power of submission betray a queering (i.e., a blurring) of normativity or a normalization of queerness. This process results in an extraordinarily submissive body that craves security. It also connects suffering with 29  Max Weber, Die Protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus (Berlin: Scribner, 1934). 30  Ibid., 181.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   227 hope and humiliation with empowerment. This body, not entirely free from the bonds of compulsive heterosexuality, is patterned after the ideal subject, such as the suffering servant in Isaiah 53, faithful Israel in the prophetic literature, or Gideon in Judges 7. The ideal subject is willing to surrender identity and autonomy in exchange for security; it accommodates neoliberal economic exploitation.

Uncovering the Connections between Economics and Biblical Theologies of Suffering: Concluding Comments The competing theologies in the Hebrew Bible place an inordinate emphasis on the redemptive value of suffering and submission. As such, they adhere to neoliberal economic structures of exploitation that require willing, submissive, and suffering bodies. As Foucault observes, power is disseminated through social institutions, and biblical scholarship facilitates the Bible as an integral player in this dissemination. Neoliberal ideologies blur the gender binary with a heightened emphasis on submission in exchange for security. This is the conundrum that arises. At first glance, the gender binary appears to be relaxed, nearly erased. Yet the binary is, indeed, strengthened at precisely the moment in which it is disassociated from the physical body. It is unwittingly solidified through biblical interpretation that produces theologies of subservience, submission, and security. The social body and, in fact, every single body regardless of its genitalia or gender identity, is rendered feminine, imagined as submissive to a masculinized power. Thus, the gender binary is only ostensibly blurred while it is fortified as the bedrock of everything. The heightened submission to power continues to be expressed in some Christian publications. For instance, R. Marie Griffith defends submissiveness for women in her eloquent and sensitive account of how submission functions as power in the lives of evangelical women.31 She explains it in this way: I have refused to interpret with undue haste the discourse of female submission as flatly or irrevocably oppressive. Such a depiction would disregard the complexities of evangelical faith and, worse, render these women’s devotional lives unrecognizable to themselves. Instead, I have taken pains to credit their piety as a meaningful source of religious and social power, laden with copious practical strategies for inverting conventional hierarchies and enabling women to influence husbands— perhaps even change or save them—and alter their family lives, as well as to create newly whole and joyful selves. As women teach it to each other, Christian submission

31  R. Marie Griffith, God’s Daughters: Evangelical Women and the Power of Submission (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1997).

228   Teresa J. Hornsby is a flexible doctrine intricately attached to control—of self and other—and freedom, rather than a rigid blueprint of silent and demoralizing subjugation.32

Griffith states that evangelical women find power in submission. There, the valorization of submission, connected to being worthy of God’s blessings, is tied to neoliberal ideologies in two ways. First, Griffith’s women believe that they must earn and deserve God’s blessings, such as water, food, children, or health. This position implies that the quality and belief system of a person determines whether she or he has access to them. Second, Griffith’s women promote the idea that a worthy or deserving person must be willing to acquiesce to power. Some Christian publications must therefore be regarded as heightened illustrations of the contemporary power of the neoliberal paradigm in their readings of the Bible. In sum, I posit that neoliberal capitalism requires submissive subjects, and biblical scholars, even myself in this present essay, are doing our part to produce them. It is a troubling proposition, I agree. Since a dynamic and global neoliberal capitalism needs and produces docile bodies who willingly submit to power, biblical scholars comply with this demand. Since neoliberal capitalism needs less bodies than industrial capitalism required, those bodies are allowed to wander within wider and more elastic sexual and gender boundaries. That’s the good news. However, neoliberal capitalism is still capitalism, as Hennessy explains: “While [postmodern sexualities] may disrupt norms and challenge state practices that are indeed oppressive, they do not necessarily challenge neoliberalism or disrupt capitalism.”33 In fact, the “more open, fluid, ambivalent sexual identities”34 must be willing and eager to suffer for this elasticity. Relaxed gender boundaries are a step in the right direction, but queerness is manufactured. It, too, serves neoliberal power structures just as much as any sanctioned expression of gender. Put bluntly, queerness does not subvert power. It also does not exist apart from or over and against the ideological center. Rather, it merely moves within that center. Queer bodies, which are, in fact, all bodies, are no longer bound to the female/male physical binary. They are enveloped into and reiterated as submissive femininity serving masculinized power. Gender exists independent of physical bodies, as it always has. It is the illusion and the promise of liberation and security—delivered through theologies of atonement—that keeps bodies bound. Biblical scholars participate in and even endorse the production of neoliberal capitalism by offering interpretations immersed in theologies of suffering, submission, and redemption and by paying for their security with the heavy price of acquiescence and obedience to the neoliberal status quo.

Bibliography Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York, NY: Routledge Press, 1990. Butler, Judith. Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of “Sex.” New York, NY: Routledge, 1993. 32  Ibid., 201–2.

33 Hennessy, Profit and Pleasure, 109.

34 Ibid.

Neoliberalism and Queer Theory in Biblical Readings   229 Harvey, David. The Condition of Postmodernity: An Enquiry into the Origins of Cultural Change. Cambridge: Blackwell, 1990. Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. Hennessy, Rosemary. Profit and Pleasure: Sexual Identities in Late Capitalism. New York, NY: Routledge, 2000. Mansfield, Nick. Masochism: The Art of Power. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997. Oksala, Johanna. “Feminism and Neoliberal Govermentality.” Foucault Studies 16 (2013): 32–53. Shepherd, Lucy J., ed. Gender Matters in Global Politics: A Feminist Introduction to International Relations. New York, NY: Routledge, 2015. Silverman, Kaja. “Masochism and Male Subjectivity.” Camera Obscura 17 (1988): 31–66.

chapter 15

Biblica l Bor der Slippage a n d Femi n ist Postcol on i a l Cr iticism Judith E. McKinlay

Borders are about containment, keeping certain people and ideologies in and certain people and ideologies out. Yet borders, like ideologies themselves, are porous, continually infiltrated, broken down, disregarded, and abandoned. The Bible knows this. Immediately after its great liturgical opening, the Tanakh moves to the garden narrative where Eve gains humankind its ethical sense by a deliberate boundary breaking that paves the way for the human couple to slip through to earth with the knowledge of good and evil. So, too, Hokma (Wisdom), she in whom YHWH delights (Prov. 8:30–31), slips through the heavenly/earthly border, persuading, even cajoling, earthly humans to keep safely within the boundary of life, by recognizing the very difference between good and evil. Eve and Hokma may be seen as biblical guides in a study of border slippage, taking as its measure the Wisdom trilogy of ethical relations, justice, and equity (Prov. 1:3b). Their texts, however, issue due warning: border engagement frequently meets with “muddiness” and “unpredictable relationships,”1 as the Genesis Garden tale and Kesilut’s smooth words teasing with death, not life (Prov. 9:13–17), testify.

Postcolonial Criticism Colonialism is a matter of slippage, explicitly planned and purposeful territorial slippage. This is the concern of postcolonial criticism with its prefix “post” announcing its focus on the consequences of people appropriating other people’s land, with all the justice 1 Carolyn J. Sharp, Irony and Meaning in the Hebrew Bible (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2009), 40, with reference to Genesis 2–3.

232   Judith E. McKinlay issues that flow from that. It is keenly interested in how colonial ideologies maintain their dominance. Jane Kelsey writes of their “durability,” that “colonial leopards do not change their spots; they just stalk their prey in different ways.”2 While this inter-relationship of past and present is seen as setting the agenda for postcolonial criticism, discussion continues about the prefix “post.” Is timing the main or sole factor, “a simple departure from the colonial past”? Or could it rather signal a “space of questioning,” as Mayra Rivera suggests?3 A space in which competing or differing ideologies from different texts and different histories and political circumstances are seen more clearly, with connections made that draw the reader into the critical fray. The questioning continues. What scholars do not question is the close relationship between the power dynamics of the colonized and the colonizer during colonialism with that of imperialism. Certainly, there is a distinction between these two. Defined by Fernando Segovia, imperialism flows from “what transpires in the controlling center,” whereas colonialism flows from “what transpires in the controlled periphery.” Yet Segovia reminds readers that these differences are not exclusive because “there is no imperialism without colonialism and colonialism without imperialism.”4 As the number of studies increases, postcolonialism has become a criticism with tentacles, not only “encompass(ing) imperialism” and colonialism but also “decolonisation, globalization and neo-colonialism.”5 As in every field, there are pathfinders. Postcolonial studies owes much to Franz Fanon, giving voice to the “wretched of the world,”6 to Edward Said, highlighting the ploys of “othering,”7 to Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, pointing not only to the silencing of the “subaltern” but also to the use of catachresis, Spivak’s term for taking the dominant discourse and turning it against itself,8 and to Homi Bhabha, recognizing the subtlety of the colonizer/colonized relationship characterized by mimicry, ambivalence, and hybridity.9 Biblical postcolonial criticism, concerned with colonial/imperial entanglements

2  Jane Kelsey, “From Flagpoles to Pine Trees: Tino Rangatiratanga and Treaty Policy Today,” in Nga Patai: Racism and Ethnic Relations in Aotearoa/New Zealand, ed. Paul Spoonley, David Pearson, and Cluny Macpherson (Palmerston North: The Dunmore Press, 1996), 178. 3  Mayra Rivera, “Ghostly Encounters: Spirits, Memory, and the Holy Ghost,” in Planetary Loves: Spivak, Postcoloniality, and Theology, ed. Stephen D. Moore and Mayra Rivera (New York, NY: Fordham University Press, 2011), 119. 4  Fernando F. Segovia, “Mapping the Postcolonial Optic in Biblical Criticism: Meaning and Scope,” in Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Interdisciplinary Intersections, ed. Stephen D. Moore and Fernando F. Segovia (The Bible and Postcolonialism; London: T&T Clark, 2005), 67. 5  Stephen D. Moore, “The Revelation to John,” in A Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament Writings, ed. Fernando F. Segovia and R. S. Sugirtharajah (London: T&T Clark, 2013), 437. 6  Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (trans. Constance Farrington; London: Penguin Books, 1967). 7  Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1978), Culture and Imperialism (London: Chatto & Windus, 1993). 8  See Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?,” in Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, eds. Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1988), 271–313. 9 Homi K. Bhabha, The Location of Culture (London: Routledge, 1994).

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   233 within and behind biblical texts, has its own history.10 Laura Donaldson’s 1996 edited issue of Semeia 75, Postcolonialism and Scriptural Reading, was a landmark. This was followed two years later by R. S. Sugirtharajah’s The Postcolonial Bible.11 That same year Kwok Pui-lan chaired the SBL session, “New Testament Studies and Postcolonial Studies.” Postcolonialism was now on the agenda, although Postcolonial Studies became a separate unit at the annual meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) only in 2011.

Feminist Biblical Postcolonial Criticism Feminist postcolonial criticism has its own history and owes much to Musa W. Dube. Her Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of the Bible, published in 2000, offered the postcolonial strategy of “Rahab’s reading prism.” She described this strategy as “a postcolonial feminist eye of many angles” that detects not only “whether a text is imperializing or anti-imperial” but also “assist(s) postcolonial readers to read against . . . patriarchal forms of oppression.”12 The distinction between the two tasks is significant. As Dube states: “[T]o confront imperialism as a postcolonial feminist, one must, first, recognize that patriarchal oppression overlaps with but is not identical with imperialism.”13 Kwok Pui-lan, recognizing “the intricate relationship” between colonialism and patriarchy, described the task in the following way: “The exploration of the Interstices of different forms of oppression under the shadow of empire constitutes the exciting postcolonial feminist project.”14 Kwok also called for “imagination” to fuel “a desire, a determination and a process of disengagement from the whole colonial syndrome” in its “many forms and guises.”15 Gale Yee had already insisted that “the study of gender must include race, class, and colonial status as categories of analysis.”16 The agenda was set, and feminist postcolonial readings continue to appear in journals, essay collections, and individual monographs. While most publications focus on narratives in which women are major players, many of the same gender/nation issues appear in the poetic texts, particularly 10  See Stephen D. Moore and Fernando F. Segovia, “Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Beginnings, Trajectories, Intersections,” in Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Interdisciplinary Intersections, ed. Moore and Segovia, 1–22, and R. S. Sugirtharajah, chap. 1, “Charting the Aftermath: A Review of Postcolonial Criticism,” in Postcolonial Criticism and Biblical Interpretation (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2002), 11–42. 11  R. S. Sugirtharajah, ed., The Postcolonial Bible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998). 12 Musa W. Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation (St. Louis, MO: Chalice, 2000),123, 201. 13  Ibid., 43. 14  Kwok Pui-lan, Postcolonial Imagination & Feminist Theology (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2005), 2. 15  Ibid., 81. 16 Gale A. Yee, Poor Banished Children of Eve; Woman as Evil in the Hebrew Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2003), 4.

234   Judith E. McKinlay those of the Prophets. Erin Runions used Bhabha’s postcolonial theory in a study of gender and nation in Micah, and Christl Maier and Carolyn Sharp edited a collection of feminist and postcolonial essays on Jeremiah.17 Underlying this work is the recognition that biblical texts, as literary artifacts, are not innocent or unworldly. They reflect attitudes honed by their writers’ own experiences. For contexts make a difference, both the contexts of the biblical writers and the contexts of the interpreters. While Israel’s jubilant conquest narratives celebrate the winning of mighty battles, as borders are crossed, with the accompanying “othering” of the defeated indigenous inhabitants, other biblical texts express Israel’s sorrow at the loss of its land through “other” peoples’ conquests, and its difficulties as a victimized people under “other” imperial rule. Different circumstances, different ideologies, different writings. Feminist postcolonial critics are also aware that these texts carry the views and ideologies of the powerful male literate elite. Rarely is the voice of the “subaltern” to be heard, more rarely indeed that of the female. Feminist postcolonial studies therefore fit with Sugirtharajah’s description of biblical postcolonial criticism in general as “an interventionist instrument which refuses to take the dominant reading as an uncomplicated representation of the past.”18 Yet if, as Sugirtharajah states, postcolonial criticism is “a reading posture” and not a methodology per se,19 choices have to be made in the positioning of this “posture.” Does one begin hunting out original contexts, editorial revisions, or additions that weave a tapestry of political complexities and ideologies? Does one engage in historical studies or choose literary tools for final-form readings? Does one read with an eye on one’s own readerly context, for it is not only biblical contexts that matter. Experiences in the reader’s own context may well echo aspects of those in and behind the biblical text. All these approaches are possible. One of Musa Dube’s suggestions and recommendations is for “reading sacred and secular texts, ancient and contemporary texts . . . side by side, to highlight (a) how they propound imperializing or decolonizing ideology, and (b) how they use gender in the discourse of subordination and domination.”20 This is similar to Edward Said’s proposed literary counterpoint, with its interweaving of different narratives.21 Tat-siong Benny Liew describes such a reading strategy as engaging in a detour “that takes one in and through a different land(scape). . . . By the time one (re) turns to the biblical text, what and how one sees will . . . have become different because of

17  Erin Runions, Changing Subjects: Gender, Nation and Future in Micah (Playing the Texts 7; London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001); Christl M. Maier and Carolyn J. Sharp, eds., Prophecy and Power: Jeremiah in Feminist and Postcolonial Perspective (The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 577; London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013). 18 R. S. Sugirtharajah, The Bible as Empire: Postcolonial Explorations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 3. 19  R. S. Sugirtharajah, “A Postcolonial Exploration of Collusion and Construction in Biblical Interpretation,” in The Postcolonial Bible, ed. R. S. Sugirtharajah (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998), 93. 20 Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of the Bible, 199–200. 21 Said, Culture and Imperialism, 51.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   235 all the differences that one has encountered along the way.”22 These juxtapositions are frequently unsettling, raising sharp questions about the readers, their contexts, and the ideologies of the texts. Complications emerge that lead to grappling with the issues of “ethical relations, justice, and equity.” Whatever the choices, significant challenges face postcolonial critics. As Graham Huggan writes: “It is arguably the greatest task of postcolonial criticism to ‘unthink’ the biases of colonialist thought,” that those of us living in postcolonial societies have consciously or unconsciously inherited.23 This challenge applies equally to biblical critics, for, as Segovia recognizes: “The reality of empire . . . constitutes an omnipresent, ­inescapable, and overwhelming reality.”24 It is to quote Ngugi wa Thiong’o, a matter of “decolonising the mind.”25 Sugirtharajah writes of “an undertaking of social and political commitment,” with its critical tools of use only “as long as they probe injustices, produce new knowledge which problematizes well-entrenched positions, and enhances the lives of the marginalized.”26 The sense of urgency, expressed by Laura Donaldson and Kwok Pui-lan, to see the interactions of colonialism, gender, and religion as “some of the most significant and contradictory forces influencing our world today,” continues to hold true.27 It is indeed clear that the work of feminist postcolonial criticism is a matter of “ethical relations, justice, and equity.” Tan Yak-hwee describes its study rightly as “a political activity.”28

Three Readings While feminist postcolonial study draws together the two critical approaches, the feminist and the postcolonial, there is always the tension of how to combine both of them, just as in feminist studies alone there can be contrasting readings with quite different conclusions. The following readings explore some of those possibilities and tensions. 22  Tat-siong Benny Liew, “Margins and (Cutting-)Edges: On the (Il)Legitimacy and Intersections of Race, Ethnicity, and (Post)Colonialism,” in Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Interdisciplinary Intersections, ed. Moore and Segovia, 146. 23  Graham Huggan, “Theory and Practice: Introduction,” in The Oxford Handbook of Postcolonial Studies, ed. Graham Huggan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 300. 24  Fernando F. Segovia, “Biblical Criticism and Postcolonial Studies: Toward a Postcolonial Optic,” in R. S. Sugirtharajah, ed., The Postcolonial Bible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998), 56. 25  Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature (London: James Currey, 1980). 26 Sugirtharajah, Postcolonial Criticism and Biblical Interpretation, 14, 100. 27  Laura E. Donaldson and Kwok Pui-lan, “Introduction,” in Postcolonialism, Feminism, and Religious Discourse, ed. Laura E. Donaldson and Kwok Pui-lan (New York, NY: Routledge, 2002), 1. See also Susanne Scholz, Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament (second rev. and exp. ed.; London: T&T Clark, 2017), 175, noting that the ultimate goal of feminist biblical studies is “the socio-political, economic, and religious understanding and transformation of androcentric and hierarchical structures in our postcolonial world.” 28  Tan Yak-hwee, “Postcolonial Feminist Biblical Criticism: An Exploration,” in Feminist Biblical Studies in the Twentieth Century: Scholarship and Movement, ed. Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014), 282.

236   Judith E. McKinlay

Miriam The book of Exodus, which offers a prelude to the conquest narratives, describes the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt. At the beginning of this text, Miriam, Moses’ unnamed sister, is a central figure who aids and abets, along with the wily midwives and Pharaoh’s daughter, the survival of Israel’s future Exodus leader (Exod. 2:4–9). Notably, a lot of women are needed to save this infant Moses. While many feminist readings celebrate this combined effort, Cheryl Exum, with a sharp twist of the lens, views it very differently. She detects the ploy of “diffusing the influence of women. . . . Imagine the power one woman would have had if she alone had saved Moses.”29 The diffusion of power among numerous women weakens the overall effect of their abetting the life of the Israelite leader. This dilemma leads to a further question. Were the women’s crucial roles “a kind of compensation” for their minor places in the narrative that follows?30 Add the postcolonial lens and Miriam’s “deferential and subservient” manner in addressing Pharaoh’s daughter comes into view, as she repeatedly assures Pharaoh’s daughter that she is acting “for you.” Angeline Song recognizes these signs. She asks whether the text does not imply that Miriam uses the overlord’s language.31 This reading comes natural to Song as a member of the oppressed Other growing up and living in a hostile Egypt. Song’s interpretation describes a differently viewed Miriam, as feminist postcolonial exegesis frequently reads from this “Other” perspective. The postcolonial reading also questions Egypt’s role in this foundational narrative. In Genesis 12, Egypt was the country to which Abram and Sarai fled from famine and where, after the Sarah debacle, Pharaoh “dealt well with Abram” (Gen. 12:16). How to reconcile these two descriptions of Egypt? Were these texts written in and for two different contexts? As Jon Berquist writes: “Egypt was Persia’s chief rival on its western borders for the early years of the Persian Empire.”32 Can one then surmise that a tale positioning Egypt as a power outwitted by slaves and even defied by women would win the Persian masters’ approval? In other words, has Israel’s cultural memory reconfigured the past to fit the circumstances of its present? While Miriam is not mentioned in the Exodus account itself, in chapter 15 she is on the “other” side, across the border of the Reed Sea. Now named and acknowledged as a “prophet” and as “Aaron’s sister,” Miriam leads the women in a victory dance, repeating the first verse of the great celebratory song. Here too a postcolonial feminist reading hesitates. Is this simply a postscript? Or is there a distancing of Miriam from the ­gloating

29  J. Cheryl Exum, “Second Thoughts about Secondary Characters: Women in Exodus 1.8–2.10,” in A Feminist Companion to Exodus to Deuteronomy, ed. Athalya Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1994), 83. 30  Ibid., 85. 31 Angeline M. G. Song, A Postcolonial Woman’s Encounter with Moses and Miriam (Postcolonialism and Religion; New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), 168. 32  Jon L. Berquist, “Postcolonialism and Imperial Motives for Canonization,” Semeia 75 (1996): 25.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   237 conquest ideology heard in Exod. 15:14–16 of the full song?33 As Gale Yee writes: “There is a darker side of the Exodus story in which the victim becomes the victimizer, and the oppressed mutates into the oppressor.”34 Is Miriam resisting this mutation? Can one claim her as a postcolonial critic before her time? Or does this reading twist the lens too far? What must be celebrated is the fact that an enslaved landless people (Israel) escaped and the subalterns have found their voice. Immediately after Miriam’s one-verse song (Exod. 15:21), Moses gives the order and the long trek of the people begins. They are now refugees, seeking a place in “other” peoples’ land. It is a narrative that resonates with the experiences of so many people fleeing destructive violence and brutal mistreatment century after century. Postcolonial criticism calls for the addition of trauma studies here.35 Is it a surprise that conflict breaks out over leadership? It is a matter of keeping human borders, and Miriam crosses the leadership boundary in challenging Moses. These human borders and boundaries are complex: Aaron, as brother, is an accomplice in the challenge. But, as a priest, he cannot be defiled. Consequently Miriam alone is left suffering the punishing defilement.36 With the challenge defeated and the boundaries firmly established, along with Miriam “recreated” after her seven days exclusion outside the camp (Num. 12: 15), the land-seeking journey continues. There is, however, no happy ending for this migrant. Num. 20:1 records her dying at Kadesh, its resonance of holiness carrying again a sense of boundaries. Miriam dies a migrant’s death. Thus, viewing Miriam through a feminist postcolonial lens is a matter of turning and turning it again, pondering what is seen.

Rahab Rahab’s story, told in Joshua 2, slips to the “other” side, to a Canaanite woman in a Canaanite city.37 How she and her actions are viewed is an important question. Is she, in Tikva Frymer-Kensky’s words, the “righteous-proselyte-prophet”?38 After all, Rahab is 33  See Judith E. McKinlay, Troubling Women and Land: Reading Biblical Texts in Aotearoa New Zealand (The Bible in the Modern World 59; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2014), 10–11. 34  Gale A. Yee, “Postcolonial Biblical Criticism,” in Methods for Exodus, ed. Thomas B. Dozeman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 214–15. 35  See Irene Visser, “Trauma Theory and Postcolonial Literary Studies,” Journal of Postcolonial Writing 47.3 (2011): 270–82; “Decolonizing Trauma Theory: Retrospect and Prospects,” Humanities 4 (2015): 250–65. 36 Claudia V. Camp, Wise, Strange and Holy: The Strange Woman and the Making of the Bible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000), 231. 37  See Judith E. McKinlay, “Rahab: A Hero/ine?,” Biblical Interpretation 7.1 (1999): 44–57; Reframing Her: Biblical Women in Postcolonial Focus (The Bible in the Modern World 1; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2004), 37–50; Troubling Women and Land, 99–119. 38  Tikva Frymer-Kensky, “Reading Rahab,” chap. in Studies in Bible and Feminist Criticism (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 2006), 218, originally published in Mordechai Cogan, Barry L. Eichler, and Jeffrey H. Tigay eds., Tehillah Le-Moshe: Biblical and Judaic Studies in Honor of Moshe Greenberg (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1997), 57–67, concluding, “in the end, it is the reader . . . who must decide.”

238   Judith E. McKinlay lauded by later writers, both Jewish and Christian, for her religious convictions. Or is she, as Musa Dube declares, a “literary phantom of imperialism’s ‘cultural bomb’ ”?39 Again it is a matter of choosing the lens and interpreting what is seen. While Rahab might appear a heroine, saving her family through wily manipulation,40 Dube warns of “the dangers of reclaiming women’s roles without naming its imperialistic agendas.”41 Viewed through Dube’s postcolonial lens, Rahab’s tale is none other than “a prescript bearing the projected desires of the coloniser.”42 What is clear is that this narrative is the prelude to Joshua’s victorious razing of Canaanite Jericho. He sends out spies to view the land in preparation for what is to be a significant military border slippage (v. 1). Once across, however, the entire campaign turns to farce. They get no further than the house of a prostitute. Rahab, living in “her house on the outer side of the city wall” (v. 15), operates as the boundary. A feminist postcolonial lens reveals a tale of sexualized conquest, sure to arouse a frisson of excitement or fear in the Israelite audience. As Carolyn Sharp recognizes: “Underneath its seductive surface, this story throbs with the terror of ideological nightmare . . . the spies spending the night with Rahab portrays the ultimate risk: that the vanguard of the Israelite invasion might be corrupted by the enticements of an actual Canaanite.”43 But did the spies really sleep with her? The MT text suppresses this idea, reporting simply that they slept “there,” at her house (v. 1). The sexual frisson comes with Rahab’s wily reply to the king’s messengers (v. 4), with its verb “come” (bo’), exploiting its double meaning and so implying the opposite. These were clients coming for sex. She may not know where they have come from or their present whereabouts, but she does “know” men.44 It is all comedy with Israelite spies hiding under flax on a prostitute’s roof. Nor does it get any better. They are forced to swear an oath to YHWH that they will not only rescue this Canaanite woman but also her family and household. No regard here for Israel’s herem order (Deut 20:17). Let down ignominiously through a window, they return to Joshua with a report couched in her words. The change from “melt in fear before you” (v. 9) to “before us” (v. 24) is the final comic irony. The feminist postcolonial interpretation of Joshua 2 uncovers a tale carrying multiple messages that are harmful on many levels. Flagged as a prostitute, Rahab functions as a cipher for a land open for entering. But she also flags “foreign” women as promiscuous, sites of un-cleanliness, a danger to all comers. As a literary representation as “Native Woman,” set “at the intersections of gender, race, and imperial power,” Rahab’s multiple identities cannot “be dismissed as just a textual representation.”45 For, as Steed Davidson explains, such representations have the power “to name reality,” and this naming affects 39 Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation, 80. 40  See McKinlay, “Rahab: A Hero/ine?,” 44–57. 41 Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation, 76. 42  Ibid., 77. 43 Sharp, Irony and Meaning, 98. 44  L. Daniel Hawk, Joshua (Berit Olam; Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2000), 43. 45  Steed Vernyl Davidson, “Gazing (at) Native Women: Rahab and Jael in Imperializing and Postcolonial Discourses,” in Postcolonialism and the Hebrew Bible: The Next Step, ed. Roland Boer (Semeia Studies 70; Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 69–70.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   239 the lives of contemporary indigenous women.46 Nasili Vaka’uta issues a call “to rehabilitate (read: ‘rahab-ilitate’) the construction of ‘native women’ in biblical and imperial crossing accounts,” both to “release” them “from the violent gaze of the Deuteronomistic porno-tropic texts and to rehabilitate how we read in order to resist buying into the illusions of imperial imagination inscribed in the text.”47 Nor do the worries end here. This Canaanite “othered” Rahab is “portrayed as one who totally believes in the superiority of the colonizer,”48 to the extent that in vv. 8–11 she even appears as a YHWH believer. Filled with Torah quotes (Exod. 15:15–16; Deut. 4:39), her speech is an Israelite testimony. Yet a postcolonial reading pauses. Is Rahab now the colonized mimic woman, using mimicry for her own purposes, her own survival?49 She quotes Deut. 4:39, but has she read Deut. 18:9? These questions, however, have to be asked of the Israelite scribe who represses Rahab’s “real otherness” and portrays her not “as Canaanite woman, but as an Israelite theologian disguised as the ‘other.’ ”50 The storytelling is skillful, as Susanne Gillmayr-Bucher notes: “On the level of the plot . . . the foreign woman appears in a superior position.” Yet read with an eye for the dominant ideology, it is clear is that “the Israelite discourse is dominating and the genuine voice of the foreigner, the other, is suppressed and silenced.”51 Israel has not only “othered” and sexualized Rahab, but also used her as a ventriloquist, to speak words “in praise of themselves as conquering heroes.”52 This is a postcolonial worry. Yet, and there is always that “and yet,” Erin Runions detects multiple layers in the tale and reads this “otherwise” again. She relishes Rahab as a queer trickster figure who “humorously mimics, shadows, and critiques the dominant and oppressive culture.”53 Choosing the lens and interpreting what is seen is a complex matter. Rahab’s story, however, does not end at Joshua 2. The epilogue in Joshua 6 reports that the two spies rescue Rahab and her household, following their sworn oath, so that “she lived in Israel until this day” (Josh. 6:25). One might wonder how Rahab slept at night, having left her people to their violent fate.54 Or is her departure a positive, as Michael 46  Ibid. On how colonial Oceania experienced the same mix of “feminized land and sexualized body,” see Nasili Vaka’uta, “Border Crossing/Body Whoring: Rereading Rahab of Jericho with Native Women,” in Bible, Borders, Belonging(s): Engaging Readings from Oceania, ed. Jione Havea, David J. Neville, and M. Elaine Wainwright (Semeia Studies 75; Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014), 144–48, notes how colonial Oceania experienced the same mix of “feminized land and sexualized body.” 47  Vaka’uta, “Border Crossing/Body Whoring,” 143, 151–2. 48 Dube, Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation, 78. 49  See Bhabha, The Location of Culture, 102–22. 50  Susanne Gillmayr-Bucher, “ ‘She Came to Test Him with Hard Questions’: Foreign Women and their View on Israel,” Biblical Interpretation 15 (2007): 148. 51 Ibid. 52  Lori L. Rowlett, “Disney’s Pocahontas and Joshua’s Rahab in Postcolonial Perspective,” in Culture, Entertainment and the Bible, ed. George Aichele (JSOTSup 309; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000), 75. 53  Erin Runions, “From Disgust to Humor: Rahab’s Queer Affect,” in Bible Trouble: Queer Reading at the Boundaries of Biblical Scholarship, ed. Teresa Hornsby and Ken Stone (Semeia Studies 67; Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2011), 70. 54  McKinlay, “Rahab: A Hero/ine?,” 53.

240   Judith E. McKinlay Carden suggests? That “[a]s the walls of Jericho collapse bringing together inside and outside, Rahab, the woman of the walls, collapses the distinction between Israelite and Canaanite.”55 Would Israel, reading this story under Persian rule, recognize faith over ethnicity as its own identity marker? Yet Josh. 6:23 has her outside the camp. Is the scribe hesitating? Is Rahab not fully Israelite? Is she Bhabha’s marginalized hybrid? Or being “racialized, minoritized, and sexualized,” is she the “perpetual foreigner”?56 Or does this “outside” space function as Bhabha’s “third space,” “initiat[ing] new signs of identity,” looking to a future “of collaboration and contestation?”57 The textual tensions remain. Still a plot cohering so closely with the ideology of conquest, with an apparent enemy not so much “melt[ing] in fear” before YHWH as melting into a potential aid and agent of Israel’s imperial plan, must remain a postcolonial worry. These are slippages that raise once again the matter of “ethical relations, justice, and equity.”

Achsah Achsah, whose story is told twice (Josh. 15:15–19; Judg. 1:11–15), appears as an Israelite already living in the land and wanting more of it. Again, there is the issue of gender in this narrative.Her father, Caleb, offers Achsah as bait, to spur on the capture of a Canaanite city. As a city, Debir (Kiriath-sepher) is grammatically feminine, a doubly gendered move. In return for taking one female entity, Othniel, the victor, is to be given another.58 Achsah is the prize, the trophy bride. In Joshua, the tale follows the recounting of “the inheritances that the Israelites received in the land of Canaan” (14:1). A lot of killing, a lot of “striking with the edge of the sword,” and a lot of “utterly destroying” has taken place since Rahab’s tale. Judges 1 differs in opening with the call: “Who shall go up first for us against the Canaanites,” with the divine answer: Judah. What does not differ in the two scribal collections, apart from a few minor word changes, is the Achsah tale itself. Once married, Achsah is not the quiet behind-the-scenes wife but she is assertive, urging or inducing Othniel to ask her father for more land.59 Further, she claims that she will act herself if Othniel does not

55  Michael Carden, “Joshua,” in The Queer Bible Commentary, ed. Deryn Guest, Robert E. Goss, Mona West, and Thomas Bohache (London: SCM Press, 2006), 158. 56  Kah-Jin Jeffrey Kuan and Mai-Anh Le Tran, “Reading Race Reading Rahab: A ‘Broad’ Asian American Reading of a ‘Broad’ Other,” in Postcolonial Interventions: Essays in Honor of R. S. Sugirtharajah, ed. Tat-siong Benny Liew (Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2009), 39, recognizing that “[s]he can be what you make of her” (41), while adding the provocative question “but for better or for worse?” 57 Bhabha, The Location of Culture, 1. 58  So Uriah Y. Kim, “Is There an “Anticonquest” Ideology in the Book of Judges?” in Postcolonialism and the Hebrew Bible: The Next Step, ed. Roland Boer (Semeia Studies 70; Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2013), 125. 59  See critical commentaries for discussions of the possible range of meanings of the verb.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   241 respond to the request, notably the MT offers none.60 And then she acts. The sentence continues without a pause, returning her to her father, as she asks him for additional springs of water, as a beraka.61 Asks? Her imperative, “give me,” sounds more like a demand.62 Was this water shortage a slippage on Caleb’s part? If so, he complies. She shows herself as the hayil woman of Proverbs, “setting her mind on a field and acquiring it” (Prov. 31:16)!63 And, like the woman of Proverbs, Achsah is practical, with an eye to the future, for “if she is to live here, then the land needs to be productive, and for that water is a must.”64 While feminists may applaud, postcolonial readers recognize an acquisitive colonial woman. Focus the postcolonial lens more sharply and more worries appear. This tale that began with the giving (away) of a woman is essentially a tale of the giving (away) of land by the victorious military leader Caleb. Viewed through a feminist lens, the story presents a woman and land as being given away at a leader’s discretion.65 This coupling of woman and land is even more explicit if Judg. 1:15 (par. Josh. 15:19) is read as Achsah having been given away “as Negev land,” which the MT allows. The key is that all this giving is of “other people’s” land. Achsah and Othniel are settlers on “other people’s” territory. The text is clear. After military success, the allotting of land follows. Breach the borders, the land is yours, with Achsah playing her part in a cameo of Israel’s idealized conquest. The parallels with the confiscation and allotment of land in nineteenth-century New Zealand are, for me, all too clear.66 Ruta Te Manuahura’s letter, dated 1881, illustrates the “other” experience. She writes: [M]y land in Waikato that was confiscated by the Government . . . . I have had much land taken from me for no reason whatever, for neither I nor my husband committed any wrong against the Crown.67

Four years later she is offered a piece of land, but where Achsah’s land is dry, her land includes a swamp and a deep gully. So, like Achsah, Ruta Te Manuahura requests “more acres in lieu of the bad portion that cannot be made use of.” This, however, is her own land! Eventually she receives sixty-eight acres, but not without a lengthy struggle. A letter from the Native Office records that “[t]his Native woman is not only the most 60  The Septuagint and Vulgate read Othniel urging Achsah to ask. Is this a variant tradition or a problem with such a female initiative? 61 Could beraka imply divine assent? Another possible worry. 62  While Joshua and Judges use different words, both verbs are in the imperative. 63  Richard D. Nelson, “What Is Achsah Doing in Judges?,” in The Impartial God: Essays in Biblical Studies in Honor of Jouette M. Bassler, ed. Calvin J. Roetzel and Robert L. Foster (New Testament Monographs 22; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2007), 20. 64 McKinlay, Troubling Women and Land, 60. 65  Nelson, “What is Achsah Doing in Judges?,” 21. 66  McKinlay, “Meeting Achsah on Achsah’s Land,” The Bible and Critical Theory 5.3 (2009): 6–7; Troubling Women and Land, 68. 67  Frances Porter and Charlotte Macdonald, “My Hand Will Write What My Heart Dictates”: The Unsettled Lives of Women in Nineteenth-Century New Zealand as Revealed to Sisters, Family and Friends (Auckland: Auckland University Press with Bridget Williams Books, 1996), 138.

242   Judith E. McKinlay difficult to satisfy but is very vexatious in respect of her land claim which has been before the office for years.”68 How unlike Caleb. Yet there is a significant slippage in Achsah’s tale. What was overtly stated in Rahab’s narrative is covertly mentioned in Achsah’s: Israel’s inherent hybridity. For Achsah is the daughter of Caleb, son of Jephunneh, the Kenizzite, and now wife of Othniel, son of Kenaz. These people are Kenizzites. She is an “other” woman gaining “other” people’s land. If this story is an ancient Kenizzite clan saga, inserted into Israel’s conquest tradition, this “otherness” is largely glossed over.69 Caleb appears as a Kenizzite in Josh. 14:6, 13–14, and Othniel as a son of Kenaz in both Achsah tales, yet their exploits are recounted as significantly Israelite. Is this the final irony? Those conquering or slipping their way into Canaan to become part of Israel’s sacred story bring “otherness” with them. Or, as Susanne Scholz suggests, they are “others . . . accepted only if they adapt to the sociopolitical and cultural religious goals of the Israelites?”70 This idea fits with the findings of two New Zealand postcolonial scholars, who recognize that while “the logic of settler colonialism attempts to eradicate all traces of prior occupation . . . [a] ‘necrophilic’ national love of the Indigenous lavishes attention on an ‘other’ that conforms with and facilitates settler sovereignty.”71 So, in Israelite terms, a “good” Kenizzite, can be a good Israelite. Borders are indeed porous. Rahab and Achsah’s narratives became part of Israel’s conquest tradition, both tales were likely told generation after generation, and heard differently according to political circumstance. Debate continues about the dating of the editing processes, but if both books were written, read, or heard in the context of imperial Persian rule, they may have been understood as “reflect(ing) the concerns and anxiety” of a people under imperial overlords. Would they have understood these tales as resistance writings, “a call for empowering the oppressed”?72 We, as readers, may sympathize with these concerns.

68  Porter and Macdonald, “My Hand Will Write”, 139. 69  So Alexander Rofé, “Clan Sagas as a Source in Settlement Traditions,” in “A Wise and Discerning Mind”: Essays in Honor of Burke O. Long, ed. Saul M. Olyan and Robert C. Culley (Brown Judaic Studies 125; Providence, RI: Brown University, 2000), 203; Ann E. Killebrew, Biblical Peoples and Ethnicity: An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, and Early Israel, 1300–1100 bce (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2005), 184, suggests various “nonindigenous groups mentioned in the biblical narrative . . . may have formed an essential element” of Late Bronze Age Israel. See also Zecharai Khallai, “The Beginnings of Israel: A Methodological Working Hypothesis,” IEJ 59.2 (2009): 196, noting the Kenites and Kenizzites “are related to the inheriting nations,” posits this “reflecting a historical process of absorption of indigenous elements.” 70  Susanne Scholz, “Judges,” in Women’s Bible Commentary, ed. Carol A Newsom, Sharon Ringe, and Jacqueline E. Lapsley (third rev. and updated ed.; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2012), 116, also asking whether this assimilation implies “immigrants . . . do what Israel could not do.” 71  Jo Smith and Stephen Turner, “Indigenous Inhabitations and the Colonial Present,” in The Oxford Handbook of Postcolonial Studies, ed. Huggan, 278, with reference to Ghassan Hag’s 2004 paper “On Loving Dead Others: Colonialism and Social Necrophilia” presented at a conference in Melbourne University. 72  Kim, “Is There an “Anticonquest” Ideology in the Book of Judges?” 115, 127. He suggests Judges is “a double-edged sword,” read as either an “imperializing” or “liberatory” text.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   243 But the dangers remain, for their imperializing and gendered messages are clearly present in the text.

Final Ponderings The recognition of the long process of retelling, rewriting, and re-editing raises the question how a community’s cultural memory relates to its sense of identity. Diana Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, drawing upon the work of cultural and social memory theorists, view biblical texts as a “network of sites of memory,” as a “memory landscape.”73 Understood in this way, “[a]ncient Israel” emerges as “an entity that imagined, remembered, and identified with . . . the ‘Israel’ constructed through . . . and evoked by reading and rereading a particular repertoire of books.”74 For instance, Gaétane-Diane Forget sees the Deuteronomistic History as “truly a window in the laboratory of Israelite cultural memory weaving.” She marvels at “the sheer genius of the tradents in their capacity to generate a common bond among its people by using stories about cult, politics and the concept of otherness.”75 The relationship between text and identity changes and evolves according to political circumstance. While Rahab’s narrative, with its conquest “memory,” bolstered Israel’s sense of identity later, the story may also have reminded returnees from Babylon that “true Israel” meant keeping people of the land outside the camp. An awareness of this dynamic relationship, as Israel continually drew upon its collective memory to maintain its sense of identity, provides a sense that the texts are active life-giving documents. What postcolonial studies highlights is memory’s “twin,” “forgetting,”76 that “need[s] to get history wrong to get nation right.”77 Ancient Canaan’s glory and right to its own land have no place in Israel’s memory bank.78 Michael Rothberg recognizes the general need in postcolonial studies for “an understanding 73  Diana Vikander Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, eds., “Introduction,” chap. in Remembering Biblical Figures in the Late Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods: Social Memory and Imagination (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), x. 74  Ehud Ben Zvi, “An Introduction and Invitation to Join the Conversation about Cities and Memory,” in Memory and the City in Ancient Israel, ed. Diana V. Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2014), 3. 75  Gaétane-Diane Forget, “Navigating ‘Deuteronomistic History’ as Cultural Memory,” Religion & Theology 17 (2010): 9. 76  Michael Rothberg, “Remembering Back: Cultural Memory, Colonial Legacies and Postcolonial Studies,” in The Oxford Handbook of Postcolonial Studies, ed. Graham Huggan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 365. 77  Patrick Evans, The Long Forgetting: Post-colonial Literary Culture in New Zealand (Christchurch: Canterbury University Press, 2007), 40–1. 78  The reference to Kiriat-Sepher, “the city of books,” in Achsah’s narrative may be an exception here. See Danna Nolan Fewell, “Deconstructive Criticism: Achsah and the (E)razed City of Writing,” in Judges & Method: New Approaches in Biblical Studies, ed. Gale A. Yee (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995), 131–2.

244   Judith E. McKinlay of “the relations between memory, identity, and violence—the trauma and rupture produced by conquest, occupation, and genocide.”79 Add gender, and this recognition is also a call, too, for feminist biblical postcolonial studies. It is a truism that readers always read from “somewhere” and that that “somewhere” makes a difference, as highlighted by Fernando Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert’s 1995 collection, Reading from This Place.80 Social location is a particular concern for postcolonial readers. As Musa Dube writes: “Former colonized lands bear the marks and scars of this history, and many times the wounds are still bleeding, physically and psychologically.”81 For her context, “the Scramble for Africa continues as a historical reality and interpretation crux for African biblical scholars.”82 For Madipoane Masenya, “Africa is the place from which we read and engage with the Bible. Reading from this place implies an acceptance of our socio-historic situatedness.”83 Context makes a difference in Laura Donaldson’s reading of Ruth in which Orpah “connotes hope.” For just as “Cherokee women have done for hundreds, if not thousands, of years, Orpah chooses the house of her clan and spiritual mother over the desire for another culture.”84 Recognizing the way in which the insistent construct of Moses’ “authentic” Hebrew roots in Exod. 2:1–4:18 denies his Egyptian hybridity, Sonia Kwok Wong advises to “read with resistance” in a Post-Handover Hong Kong to maintain “dialectical strength of hybridity.”85 While most postcolonial critics write from contexts of the colonized, biblical readers whose heritage lies with colonizers and colonial settlers need to make their own connections, acknowledging, with Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, “the risk of taking over (colonizing) yet again.”86 Ironically, postcolonial readers sometimes face the accusation of being “unfaithful.” Jione Havea observes this problem when he explains: “[C]ritics assume that if they are postcolonial in their way of thinking then they should not be involved in faith-related activities, as if postcolonial thinking is only for ‘secular people’ but not for people of

79  Rothberg, “Remembering Back,” 364. 80  Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert, eds., Reading from this Place: Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective (vol. 2; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995). 81  Musa W. Dube, “Introduction: The Scramble for Africa as the Biblical Scramble for Africa: Postcolonial Perspectives,” in Postcolonial Perspectives on African Biblical Interpretations, ed. Musa W. Dube, Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012), 15. 82 Ibid. 83  Madipoane Masenya, “Anything New under the Sun of African Biblical Hermeneutics in South African Old Testament Scholarship? Incarnation, Death and Resurrection of the Word in Africa,” Verbum et Ecclesia 36.1 (2015): 3. 84  Laura E. Donaldson, “The Sign of Orpah: Reading Ruth Through Native Eyes,” in Ruth and Esther, ed. Athalya Brenner (A Feminist Companion to the Bible; Second Series 3; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 143. 85  Sonia Kwok Wong, “The Birth, Early Life, and Commission of Moses: A Reading from PostHandover Hong Kong,” in Exodus and Deuteronomy, ed. Athalya Brenner and Gale A. Yee (texts@ contexts; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2012), 155. 86  Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, “Whose Text Is It?” JBL 127.1 (2008): 17.

Biblical Border Slippage and Feminist Postcolonial Criticism   245 faith.”87 Yet most feminist postcolonial scholars, whether confessional or not, are drawn by a strong commitment to “ethical relations, justice, and equity.” In many ways, the texts themselves invite postcolonial engagement, as they are read in a world where boundary violence and ethnic conflict sadly remain live issues. There is a further question whether biblical postcolonial criticism is simply an academic “in-house” matter. If it is a political act to connect present contexts with history, how and to whom does it reach out? Stephen Moore, summarizing Aijaz Ahmad’s trench­ant critique, writes of the products of postcolonial theory being “turned,” like goods imported from the Third World, “into refined or luxury products for a privileged intelligentsia . . . all direct engagement with the extra-academic world . . . being foreclosed almost as a matter of course.”88 While Ahmad was writing from the particular context and time of 1992, the question needs to stay on the agenda. There is also the matter of appropriate writing style. Sugirtharajah writes of the “scholarly” expectation of “an insider writing style that involves complicated phrases and syntax” effectively excluding the outsider.89 These are ongoing concerns. In summary, Malebogo Kgalemang writes: Postcolonial feminist analysis of the Bible “reads” and “writes” woman at the collusion and intersection of patriarchy, imperialism, neocolonialism, gender, nation, and religion in the Bible. It is rooted in postcolonial feminist theory, in postcolonial biblical interpretation, and in feminist interpretation of the Bible.

In sum, postcolonial feminist interpretation involves “pointing out a crucial lack of attention to the colonial and imperial history of the Bible” and the “colonial and imperial history” of our world.90 This task is our challenge. For those of us working in the field, feminist postcolonial criticism is both personal and political. Despite the questions raised, and the difficulties posed, commitment and passion fuel postcolonial feminist criticism. The work is and needs to be ongoing, just as there is no end to the reading and understanding of texts.

87  Jione Havea, “Sitting Jonah with Job: Resailing Intertextuality,” The Bible & Critical Theory 12.1 (2016): 96 n. 3. 88  Stephen D. Moore, “Questions of Biblical Ambivalence and Authority under a Tree Outside Delhi, or, the Postcolonial and the Postmodern,” in Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Interdisciplinary Intersections, ed. Moore and Segovia, 82, referring to Ahmad, In Theory, Classes, Nations, Literatures (London: Verso, 1992). 89  Sugirtharajah in D. N. Premnath, “Margins and Mainstream: An Interview with R. S. Sugirtharajah,” in Border Crossings: Cross-Cultural Hermeneutics, ed. D. N. Premnath (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2007), 157. 90  Malebogo Kgalemang, “A Postcolonial Feminist Reading of Mark 14–16,” in Postcolonial Perspectives on African Biblical Interpretations, ed. Musa W. Dube, Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012), 442.

246   Judith E. McKinlay

Bibliography Donaldson, Laura  E., and Kwok Pui-Lan, eds. Postcolonialism, Feminism and Religious Discourse. New York, NY: Routledge, 2002. Dube, Musa W. Postcolonial Feminist Interpretation of the Bible. St. Louis, MO: Chalice, 2000. Dube, Musa W., Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango, eds. Postcolonial Perspectives on African Biblical Interpretations. SBLGPBS 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Huggan, Graham, ed. The Oxford Handbook of Postcolonial Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Kwok, Pui-lan, Postcolonial Imagination & Feminist Theology. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2005. McKinlay, Judith  E. Troubling Women and Land: Reading Biblical Texts in Aotearoa New Zealand. The Bible in the Modern World, 59. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2014. Maier, Christl M., and Carolyn J. Sharp, eds. Prophecy and Power: Jeremiah in Feminist and Postcolonial Perspective. LHBOTS 577. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013. Sugirtharajah, R. S. Exploring Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: History, Method, Practice. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.

chapter 16

On the Dev el opm en t of a Fem i n ist Biblica l Her m en eu tics of Migr ation Susanne Scholz

Millions of people have left their homes worldwide due to ongoing military conflict and war, political and social persecution, climate change, or economic deprivation. Of the 65.3 million people forcibly displaced in the world,1 women and children are in the numerical majority, especially within certain regions, such as Syria.2 According to U.N. statistics, 244 million international migrants lived abroad worldwide in 2016, a 42 percent increase since 2000.3 Some estimates suggest that the numbers of climate migrants might rise to 1 billion people by 2050.4 This fact raises the question how feminist Bible interpreters address the global migration and refugee crisis as an exegetical problem in the neoliberal era that has put so many people on the move. Ought feminist (and non-feminist) Bible scholars, whether they are secular, Christian, or Jewish, not 1  For this number, see, e.g., Kristin Myers, Refugee, “Migrant, IDP: What’s the Difference?” (February 2, 2017); available at http://www.concernusa.org/story/refugee-migrant-idp-whats-thedifference/?utm_source=adwords&utm_medium=ppc&utm_campaign=with-refugees&utm_ content=IDP-explainer&gclid=CKrfrsychNMCFQysaQodiBAIDg. For additional statistics on migrants and refugees in the world, see The U.N. Refugee Agency at http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/figures-at-aglance.html. 2  The U.N. produces an annual International Migration Report; for the most recent one from 2016, see here: http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/publications/ migrationreport/docs/MigrationReport2015_Highlights.pdf. For a commentary, see, e.g., the report here: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2017/feb/02/keith-ellison/ rep-keith-ellison-correct-demographic-overview-syr/. 3  See http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/figures-at-a-glance.html. 4  Baher Kamal, “Climate Migrants Might Reach One Billion by 2050,” Inter Press Service News Agency (August 21, 2017): http://www.ipsnews.net/2017/08/climate-migrants-might-reach-one-billionby-2050/.

248   Susanne Scholz reflect on the purpose and rationale of reading biblical literature in light of the pervasive social dislocation of so many people who often, though not always, hail from Bible-reading and Bible-affiliated religious traditions? The answer must be a resounding “yes” despite the considerable hesitation of Western countries to welcome migrating people. Reasons for the hesitation are complex and should not be dismissed offhandedly, and the concerns of hosting populations need to be taken seriously as well. At the same time, the hesitation should also indicate that feminist Bible scholars need to exegete the Bible in the context of the massive social dislocations taking place in our time. This essay discusses some of the hermeneutical and methodological issues related to developing a feminist biblical hermeneutics informed by the contemporary global humanitarian crisis of migration. Three main sections structure the discussion. The first section examines how feminist Bible interpreters have dealt with the topic of migration. The second section presents reasons for establishing a sociological framework as part of a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration. The third section considers how feminist biblical scholars might proceed methodologically, as they connect their work to the global migration and refugee crisis of the neoliberal era. The conclusion reiterates the need for a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration.

The Topic of Migration in Feminist Biblical Studies Although the Bible is a book about migrants and refugees and although migration is generally recognized as being “basically gendered,”5 feminist scholars have not flocked to biblical texts, biblical characters, or the biblical interpretation history with migrants and refugees in mind.6 Still, some feminist exegetes bring migration to the forefront of 5  Gemme Tulud Cruz, “It Cuts Both Ways: Religion and Filipina Domestic Workers in Hong Kong,” in Gender, Religion, and Migration: Pathways of Integration, ed. Glenda Tibe Bonifacio and Vivienne Sm. Angeles (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2010), 6. 6  It should be emphasized that the marginalization of migration does not only occur in feminist biblical studies but also in the field at large. Many books dealing with migration and exile in biblical texts do not include works on biblical migrant women or the issue of gender; see, e.g., Mark J. Boda, Frank Ritchel Ames, John Ahn, and Mark Leuchter, eds., The Prophets Speak on Forced Migration (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2015); Van Thanh Nguyen and John M. Prior, eds., God’s People on the Move: Biblical and Global Perspectives on Migration and Mission (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2014); J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu, Andrea Fröchtling, and Andreas Kunz-Lübcke (eds.), Babel Is Everywhere: Migrant Readings from Africa, Europe and Asia (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2013); James K. Hoffmeier, The Immigration Crisis: Immigrants, Aliens, and the Bible (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2009). See also for a lack of discussions on gender the journal issue devoted to “Immigration” in Insights: The Faculty Journal of Austin Seminary 124.2 (Spring 2009): 2–39. Also a discussion on Hispanic immigration in the United States does not reference gender; see M. Daniel Carroll R., “The Bible, the Church, and Human Rights in Contemporary Debates about Hispanic Immigration in the United States,” Latin American Theology 2.1 (2007): 161–84. For the inclusion of one article on gender in the field of migration studies in general, see Tristan Pearce, “Gender, Migration, and (Global)

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   249 their readings, relying on various strategies to highlight the issue in their interpretations. Several approaches stand out in such studies on biblical migration.7 Many feminist exegetes focus on individual biblical characters, such as Sarah, Ruth, and Esther, or even the male-performing prophet Ezekiel.8 These interpretations sympathize with the fates of biblical migrants, lifting up their stories in caring ways. Some of them recognize that the individualistic focus is “less than satisfactory”9 because it presents migration as a personal issue, even though most migrants leave their native lands because of societal, political, economic, or cultural difficulties. Often famine or war make them decide to leave the land in which they had grown up. Yet the individualized approach is popular on the grassroots level because this approach enables readers to identify with biblical women migrants as sympathetic figures.10 Some feminist interpreters modify the individual focus by correlating migrating women in the Bible to the experiences of contemporary women migrants. For instance, Athalya Brenner places the biblical character of Ruth in analogy to migrant women’s experiences in contemporary Israel.11 Brenner rejects romanticized approaches to Ruth Environmental Change,” in Routledge Handbook of Environmental Displacement and Migration, ed. Robert McLeman and François Gemenne (New York, NY: Routledge, 2018), 125–34. 7  This essay does not include feminist postcolonial biblical scholarship because these works focus on geopolitics more than on migration. For a comprehensive analysis of feminist postcolonial scholarship on the Bible, see my essay, “Postcolonial Biblical Criticism and Feminist Studies,” in Oxford Handbook on Postcolonial Biblical Criticism, ed. R. S. Sugirtharajah (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019); available at: https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190888459.001.0001/ oxfordhb-9780190888459-e-12. 8  See, e.g., Kwok Pui-lan, “Finding a Home for Ruth: Gender, Sexuality, and the Politics of Otherness,” in New Paradigms for Bible Study: The Bible in the Third Millennium, ed. Robert M. Fowler, Edith Blumhofer, and Fernando F. Segovia (New York, NY: T&T Clark International, 2004), 135–54; Jean-Pierre Ruiz, “Abram and Sarai Cross the Border: A Reading,” chap. in Readings from the Edges: The Bible and People on the Move (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2011), 57–70; T. M. Lemos, “ ‘They Have Become Women’: Judean Diaspora and Postcolonial Theories of Gender and Migration,” in Social Theory and the Study of Israelite Religion: Essays in Retrospect and Prospect, ed. Saul M. Olyan (Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012), 81–109. 9  Judith Gruber, “Remembering Borders: Notes toward a Theology of Migration,” in Migration as a Sign of the Times: Toward a Theology of Migration, ed. Judith Gruber and Sigrid Rettenbacher (Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill/Rodopi, 2015), 91. 10  See, e.g., Nellie Choi, ed., Seeking Fullness of Life: Biblical Meditations on Women and Migration from Women around the Globe (New York, NY: United Methodist Women, 2013); Bonnie Honig, “Ruth, the Model Emigrée: Mourning and the Symbolic Politics of Immigration,” Political Theory 25.1 (1997): 112–36. 11  Athalya Brenner, “From Ruth to the ‘Global Woman’: Social and Legal Aspects,” Interpretation 64.2 (April 2010): 162–68. Earlier versions of Brenner’s effort to read Ruth as a biblical migrant similar to migrants in contemporary Israel, see her “Ruth as a Foreign Worker and the Politics of Exogamy,” in A Feminist Companion to Ruth and Esther, ed. Athalya Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 158–62; “Was, wenn ich Rut bin?,” Bibel und Kirche 54.3 (1999): 117–20, 122. For a correlation of Ruth with the people of Hong Kong, see Sin-lung Tong, “The Key to Successful Migration? Rereading Ruth’s Confession (1:16–17) through the Lens of Bhabha’s Mimcry,” in Reading Ruth in Asia, ed. Jione Havea and Peter H. W. Lau (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2015), 35–46. Ton sums up her essay with this statement on p. 46: “The lens of Bhabha’s mimicry, nevertheless, allows us to see how a typically marginalized outsider survives possible struggles and perhaps even challenges the dominant culture.

250   Susanne Scholz that describe her as a daughter-in-law loving her mother-in-law so much that the younger woman chooses to follow the older woman wherever the journey will take them. Brenner criticizes the exegetical tendency that idealizes Ruth’s story as a love story, proposing: Let us ask ourselves why, in our interpretations of the Bible, we are often biased in favor of finding spiritual motives over practical ones; why, wherever we can, we value imagined sentiments of religiosity over the primary will to survive; why reading as if for today does not encompass today’s lessons as applicable to texts of the past and vice versa; why we have to idealize not only Ruth but the Bible as a whole.12

Brenner urges interpreters to recognize that Ruth migrates to the land of her mother-in-law to improve her economic and social status.13 She is like migrant women in Israel. As Brenner explains, today’s migrant women leave their native countries to improve their “eating, sheltering, multiplying, speaking, and breathing.”14 Brenner also observes that Ruth is in a better situation than contemporary migrant women in Israel. The latter are forced to leave their home countries for financial reasons whereas Ruth leaves voluntarily. Yet like contemporary migrant women, Ruth remains a foreigner. She is “always called ‘Moabite’ ” and she is never fully integrated into the host society. Like them, she performs manual labor although she is probably luckier than them. She marries a rich local man who improves her civil and legal status. In addition, she enhances her social status in the patriarchal host society by giving birth to a son.15 Still, the new mother immediately disappears from the narrative after having fulfilled her duty as a woman in a patriarchal world. She remains a migrant who is “never an ‘in’ person,”16 a fate she shares with female migrants in contemporary Israel. Brenner thus urges feminist exegetes to read Ruth’s story in alignment with today’s migrant women and to reject romanticized readings of this biblical book. Other feminist exegetes reverse the order by reading contemporary immigration issues in light of biblical migration stories. For instance, Dorothea Erbele-Küster ­considers In this chapter, Ruth’s mimicry is taken as a source of imagination for Hong Kong people to rethink their relationship with China.” For a discussion on biblical dreams compared to dreams of Filipina migrant women in Hong Kong, see Wai Ching (Angela) Wong, “ ‘Same Bed, Different Dreams’: An Engendered Reading of Families in Migration in Genesis and Hong Kong,” in Genesis, ed. Athalya Brenner, Archie Chi Chung Lee, and Gale A. Yee (texts @ contexts; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2010), 191–210. 12  Ibid., 168. For another study of the book of Ruth in the context of migration, see Bridget Saladino Culpepper, “Locking Up: Ruth, Sexual Choices, Migration, and Women’s Struggle for Survival,” (Ph.D. thesis, Marylhurst University, 2008). 13  For an overall contextual approach to the book of Ruth, see Havea and Lau, eds., Reading Ruth in Asia. 14 Ibid. 15  Ibid., 167. 16  Ibid. For a discussion of the insider/outsider dynamic of South African feminist biblical scholarship, see Madipoane Maseya (Ngawan’a Mphahlele), “For Ever Trapped? An African Voice on Insider/Outsider Dynamics within South African Old Testament Gender-Sensitive Frameworks,” OTE 27.1 (2014): 189–204.

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   251 Ruth “from the perspective of immigration and gender issue” because, in her view, this biblical book “provides new insights for the sociopolitical discussions in Germany and in the Netherlands, where I live.”17 Arguing on the basis of a linguistic-historical approach, Erbele-Küster explains that the noun, ger, refers to “an alien sojourner in a foreign country.” The noun should be translated as “immigrant”18 because in ancient Israel a ger “lives under restricted legal rights,”19 cannot own land, and is often confined to the limited protections given to orphans, widows, and the poor. Ruth’s father-in-law, Elimelech, who is originally from Judah, is such a ger. Although Erbele-Küster compares contemporary with Israelite experiences of migration, she recognizes that Ruth’s attempt to assimilate into a foreign culture is not a “practical and useful model for [today’s] multireligious society.”20 Ruth is a second-class citizen in the host society because the biblical imaginary does not view “integration” as “a dialectical proc­ess in which each other’s differences have to be respected.”21 In the Bible, immigrants never integrate; they remain foreigners. For instance, in the book of Ruth the town’s older women refuse “female solidarity,” excluding “the foreign woman,” although “Ruth . . . shows fidelity to her old mother-in-law Naomi.”22 Another distinction between biblical and contemporary ideas about migration makes the correlation difficulty. Erbele-Küster explains that immigration is not “an economic problem” in biblical migration stories but an issue with “ethnic and religious implications.”23 In other words, biblical migrants are excluded for ethnic and religious reasons but not for economic ones. Different from Brenner, then, Erbele-Küster does not read biblical migration stories as tales in which female characters seek to improve their material conditions like contemporary migrants. Rather, biblical migration stories articulate gendered migration experiences in which foreigners remain “other” due to their different ethnicities and religious traditions. Erbele-Küster, however, does not explain further how this biblical view reinforces contemporary positions about migration that are often based on stereotypical thinking about ethnicity and religious difference. Several feminist biblical scholars employ yet another approach to migration. They correlate biblical views of migration to contemporary geopolitical contexts. Two essays in an anthology about biblical migration from Asian perspectives illustrate this approach. One essay, written by Yoon Kyung Lee, relates the situation of the population in the Persian Yehud to contemporary South Korea, especially as the situation in both contexts pertains to the contestation of intermarriage and multiculturalism. Lee grounds her interpretation in a historical-literary method to depict a nativist position that justifies socio-political inequality among native and migrant populations with ethnic arguments. In the Persian Yehud, the nativist position appears in Ezra’s and Nehemiah’s discussions 17  Dorothea Erbele-Küster, “Immigration and Gender Issues in the Book of Ruth,” Voices from the Third World 25.1–2 (June–December 2002): 32. 18  Ibid., 33. 19 Ibid. 20  Ibid., 35. 21  Ibid. For an opposite assessment, see Agnethe Siquans, “Foreignness and Poverty in the Book of Ruth: A Legal Way for a Poor Foreign Woman to Be Integrated into Israel,” Journal of Biblical Literature 128.3 (2009): 443–52. 22  Ibid., 37. 23  Ibid., 38.

252   Susanne Scholz on intermarriage. Lee finds this position articulated indirectly in Third Isaiah even though these biblical chapters advance universalizing ideas about humans in relation to God. The universalizing ideas, however, indicate that in the Persian Yehud not everybody accepted essentialized notions of ethnicity with which people were asked to stay away from foreigners and to keep their religious purity intact. Lee suggests that biblical prohibitions of intermarriage attempted to eradicate the native population’s acceptance of “foreigners.” In other words, in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah the prohibition of intermarriage counteracted the practice of intermarriage among the Yehud native and migrant populations. Lee grounds her historical-literary hypothesis within contemporary South Korea where she sees a similar dynamic at work. South Korea is a country on the “threshold of a multicultural society, specifically in terms of ethnicity,”24 in which anti-migrant views oppose the native population’s mingling with migrants. Said differently, the ethnocentric notion of prohibiting migrants from becoming part of society must be read as an apologetic rhetoric that upholds exclusionary rules to eradicate the native population’s tolerant behavior. The second essay, written by Yani Yoo, also connects biblical migration stories with a contemporary geopolitical context. She recognizes the book of Esther as an empire-friendly story that nurtures colonial oppression similar to what occurs in Korea today.25 In Yoo’s interpretation, the book of Esther is “an empire story promoting its interests, rather than a survival story of the suffering minorities” and “[t]he narrator’s desire was disguised in the name of survival of oppressed minorities.”26 Yoo finds a similar dynamic executed in her native Korea in which: the Korean government divides its people and takes advantage of the conflict among them. The empire encourages its people to be in the game of power and money so 24  Yoon Kyung Lee, “Post Exilic Jewish Experience and Korean Multiculturalism,” in Migration and Diaspora: Exegetical Voices from Northeast Asian Women, ed. Hisako Kinukawa (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014), 3–18, 15. Unfortunately, Lee’s discussion ends with a classic anti-Jewish Christian argument that regards Jesus as the superior bringer of social justice. Lee writes on p. 16 in the semi-last sentence: “Only when Jesus came did the issue of pure and impure blood reopen, and a remedy was found to be able to go forward.” 25  Yani Yoo, “Desiring the Empire: Reading the Book of Esther in Twenty-first Century Korea,” in Migration and Diaspora: Exegetical Voices from Northeast Asian Women, ed. Hisako Kinukawa (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2014), 31–46. For a non-feminist, Latin American reading of the book of Esther, see Auiles Ernesto Martínez, “Mordechai and Esther: Migration Lessons from Persian Soil,” Journal of Latin American Theology 4.1 (2009): 16–50. Martínez identifies “migration” as “a powerful axis upon which the plot of Esther rests and moves.” He asserts that Esther and her uncle, Mordecai, are “migrants and, as a result, foreigners” when “we, as readers, see ourselves as people who constantly move from one place to another or who at least adopt this viewpoint for a moment” (p. 19, p. 18). Yet Martinez’s retelling does not adapt an explicitly feminist stance, and so his essay does not offer a feminist reading. Instead, the emphasis in his retelling is on “Forced Migration” (p. 21), “Integration to Persian Society and Upward Mobility” (p. 22), “Imperialism and its Socio-Political Structure” (p. 25), ‘MajorityMinority Conflicts” (p. 28), “Ethnic Consciousness and Internal Solidarity (p. 38), “Social Privilege and Retaliation” (p. 41), and “Ritualizing the Journey” (p. 42). Considerations of gender, sexism, misogyny, or heteronormativity in their intersectional manifestations do not define Martinez’s approach. 26  Ibid., 45.

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   253 that people do not dream of rebellion. They would rather dream of becoming ­emperors. The empire and its people are conspirators in the money and power game.27

In such a geopolitical climate, migration becomes an easy target for elites who put various population groups against each other. For Yee, the book of Esther ought to be read with this political insight in mind to deconstruct empire desires “in twenty-first century Korea.”28 Readers will then recognize the biblical book as “an empire story promoting its interests, rather than a survival story of the Diaspora.”29 The story emphasizes power, food, and sex to legitimize imperial, especially male imperial, desire. The characterization of Haman, Esther, and Mordecai as migrants reinforces the notion of the empire as the foundation of life. In fact, the empire is so strong that it even tells narratives in which the oppressed population defeats the empire. The book of Esther imagines “a few who made it to the top of the mainstream society,”30 giving everybody the idea of success. Yet this dream guarantees ultimate power to the elite strata of society. Yoo finds this rhetorical strategy also at work in contemporary Korea although, in her view, the book of Esther illustrates why this strategy must be rejected. It is empire-friendly for which migrants pay a heavy price. They violate their own rights for the illusive dream of success in a foreign land. It demands that they betray themselves. Yet another feminist approach to the topic of migration in the Bible stands out. The South African bosadi Old Testament scholar, Madipoane Maseynya (Ngwan’a Mphahlele), articulates this approach in a discussion of Jer. 21:1–10.31 Maseynya proposes that migration and exile do not necessarily require people to move beyond their native territories because “the place of exile can occur even within one’s own territory,”32 as contemporary African and South African women know very well. Maseynya explains that African women experience themselves as “foreigners” in their own land because of the denigration of their culture in favor of “the hegemonic Western Eurocentric culture”33 prevalent even in postcolonial Africa. They live in “socio-economic exile,” making them wonder whether they “thirst most of all to be liberated from [their] colour, from [their] class, [their] ignorance of [their] tradition, from economic domination.”34 Maseynya asserts that “life-denying forces typify one’s exilic state,” and so “injustice and oppression are also ‘places of exile.’”35 With this hermeneutical insight in mind, she interprets Jer. 21:1–10 as a recommendation for life in exile. 27  Ibid., 46. The other essay, entitled “The Samaritan Woman from the Perspective of a Korean Divorcee,” is written by Chanhee Heo who discusses the issue of divorce in the New Testament and in Korea. 28  Ibid. 31. 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31  Madipoane Maseynya (Ngwan’a Mphahlele), “Invisible Exiles? An African-South African Woman’s Reconfiguration of ‘Exile’ in Jeremiah 21:1–10,” OTE 20.3 (2007): 756–71. She defines a “bosadi” (womanhood) reading as being grounded in the lives and perspectives of black South African women; see, e.g., her explanations in “For Ever Trapped? An African Voice on Insider/ Outsider Dynamics within South African Old Testament Gender-Sensitive Frameworks,” OTE 27.1 (2014): 199–200. 32  Ibid. 761. 33  Ibid., 760. 34 Ibid. 35  Ibid., 761.

254   Susanne Scholz Maseynya’s approach does not focus on individual female characters, and it does not correlate biblical women’s stories with contemporary migration. It also does not highlight topics of migration, such as intermarriage or empire language as the recommended focus of (feminist) biblical commentary on migration. Rather, Maseynya grounds her analysis in a bosadi hermeneutics, examining whether the exhortation in Jeremiah can and should be applied to South African women’s experiences of being exiled within their own country. She observes that the biblical passage gives “a choice between two ‘evils’: either to remain in the city and face death or to escape death by trading their lives through submitting to the enemy.”36 In other words, survival depends on the listeners in Jerusalem if they are able to accept “displacement in a foreign country.”37 In fact, verses 8–9 recommend that listeners “choose exile and live.”38 Maseynya agrees with historical critics who argue that late exilic and post-exilic writers in Babylon composed this passage in Jeremiah. When they wrote Jer. 21:1–10, they justified the exilic experience as a strategy of survival decades after the Babylonian exile had occurred. Yet Maseynya questions whether this line of thinking about the Babylonian exile should be accepted as “the only exile story available then.”39 She knows that exile does not begin by leaving one’s country; it occurs much earlier. Masenya explains: In the case of the African people in South Africa, there is a group of people who, since the colonial and apartheid eras, have come to embrace what is means to survive. That group is African women. They have been victimized not only by Western imperialist forces but also patriarchy within the broader (global) culture as well as the African culture.40

In her view, African women should not adhere to the recommendation of Jer. 21:1–10 and they should not surrender to imperial power. Rather, they need to “read with caution” those passages that were written “from the perspectives of the powerful.”41 Most importantly, they need to look for the “invisible exile stories,”42 asking: What if the exhortation to seek life in exile is ideologically rooted? What if these words formed part of the strategy of the Babylonian exiles, who had access to the final formation of Jeremiah, to overlook every Jew who did not experience the Babylonian exile? What if there was an intentional move by the editors to curb any participation of such Jews in the shaping of the future of their people?43

In short, Maseynya proposes that a bosadi reading does not follow the advice of Jer. 21:1–10 because “[t]he invitation to choose exile, a place of injustice and oppression, and live, even at the risk of giving one’s life as booty for war, cannot be a helpful one to African women not only in South Africa, but also on the rest of the African continent.”44 African-South African women, who are conscious of their marginalization and 36  Ibid., 764. 40  Ibid., 766–7. 44  Ibid., 770.

37 Ibid. 38 Ibid. 39  Ibid., 766. 41  Ibid., 767. 42  Ibid., 769. 43  Ibid., 767.

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   255 s­ uppression, reject the ideology of this biblical passage as unhelpful “towards the transformation of their exilic states.”45 They have to tell their own exile stories so that they will come to understand “reality.”46 Coming from an exilic South African feminist Bible scholar, this advice is powerful. Her explanations demonstrate that a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration turns into an all-encompassing project that analyzes oppression and injustice in the world. In sum, feminist exegetes use different hermeneutical approaches in their studies on migration in the Bible. Many interpreters focus on individual biblical women figures to bring attention to migration in the Bible. Some scholars correlate the situation of today’s migrants to biblical women migrants. Other exegetes reverse the direction by connecting biblical texts about female migrants to contemporary settings. Still other interpreters relate ethnocentric and empire-friendly positions, articulated in various biblical books, to contemporary geopolitical contexts in which migration features prominently. One feminist interpreter offers perhaps the most creative and exegetically beneficial approach. Defined as a bosadi hermeneutic, this approach not only employs a hermeneutic of suspicion to biblical texts about exile, but it also highlights the invisible exiles of African and South African women in their own countries while socio-political, economic, and religious marginalization and oppression have battered people for a very long time. Women in particular face exile in their daily lives. Thus, the bosadi hermeneutics recognizes that experiences of alienation, exile, and migration occur not only in “foreign” lands but also at home. This insight is important for the development of a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration. Interestingly, feminist interpreters have yet to offer a comprehensive analysis of migration in the Bible or study the interpretation history on biblical migration to explain the field’s reticence to engage the topic. This essay proposes strategies to remedy this lacuna in (feminist) biblical studies. It suggests moving feminist biblical studies beyond selected text studies and to develop a comprehensive agenda for studying migration in biblical studies. More specifically, I propose developing a sociological framework within which to read the Bible as migration literature, with a focus on gender. The next section explains how to create such a sociological framework as part of a feminist migration hermeneutics.

Toward a Sociological Framework for a Feminist Migration Hermeneutics In a world in which people, especially women and children, are on the move more than ever before in human history, feminist biblical exegetes need to develop a sociological framework for their exegetical work. As Davina Lopez and Todd Penner express it so 45 Ibid.

46 Ibid.

256   Susanne Scholz well, we need to investigate “the epistemological effects of scholarly discourses and the ethical implications embedded therein.”47 We need to understand biblical interpretations as past and present contributions to the geopolitical, cultural, and religious discourses and practices on migration. Hence, feminist biblical scholarship must analyze how interpreters have indirectly or directly participated in the socio-political, economic, and religious politics and legislation about migration. Conceptualized as sociological-framed scholarship, feminist biblical exegesis needs to expose biblical interpretations not as “true” or “false,” “objective” or “subjective,” and “exegetical” or “eisegetical,” but as ideological constructs coming from somewhere and being created by socially located readers. In the context of migration, sociologically framed investigations must concern themselves with migratory discourses on and about the Bible. This kind of sociological analysis assumes that interpreters have already made culturally, politically, and religiously charged claims about the world when they construct biblical meanings. After all, interpreters articulate their readings within the world even when they do not openly disclose assumptions, politics, and belief systems. A sociologically framed analysis makes obvious who says what, how they say what they say, what their sayings mean in the context of the interpretative enterprise, and how interpreters align with worldly power dynamics. Accordingly, a sociologically framed analysis describes, investigates, and evaluates ideologies of power as part and parcel of exegetical discourse. Thus, crucially, a sociologically framed analysis encourages biblical research to move from a text-centric to a cultural-analytical project, or as Vincent L. Wimbush puts it, a sociologically framed analysis opens up the field to the “complexity of social dynamics as social textu(r)alization.”48 In addition, this kind of sociologically framed analysis resists assimilating the academic study of the Bible into the geopolitical, cultural, or religious status quo that ignores migration as a relevant topic. The sociological framework changes the function, purpose, and agenda of biblical hermeneutics. It ensures that the nexus between reading and society, reading and culture, and reading and politics is not relegated to an invisible place in the past. The sociological framework teaches that meaning-making processes are contextual and socially located, and never universal, objective, or value-neutral. This framework exposes assertions of singular, monolithic, and unilateral biblical meaning as hermeneutical attempts to obfuscate readerly interests in the world. A sociologically defined analysis thus advances an epistemology that challenges claims of objectivity, universality, and value-neutrality, and it promotes textual fluidity, multiplicity, and “creolization.” A sociology of biblical hermeneutics makes clear that biblical interpretations participate in hermeneutically dynamic and politically and religiously charged conversations over socio-cultural practices. 47  Davina Lopez and Todd Penner, “Homelessness as a Way Home: A Methodological Reflection and Proposal,” in Holy Land as Homeland? Models for Constructing the Historic Landscapes of Jesus, ed. Keith W. Whitelam (Social World of Biblical Antiquity 2.7; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011), 166. 48  Vincent L. Wimbush, “Interrupting the Spin: What Might Happen if African Americans Were to Become the Starting Point for the Academic Study of the Bible,” USQR 52 (1998): 75.

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   257 In other words, a feminist migration hermeneutics of the Bible that is conceptualized within a sociological framework does not further perpetuate the colonizing hermeneutical assumptions of the field, as they have developed since the eighteenth century. The literary critic Edward W. Said explained that “[t]he intellectual’s role is . . . to challenge and defeat both an imposed silence and the normalized quiet of unseen power wherever and whenever possible.”49 When Bible scholars were at their best, they critiqued hegemonically positioned religious authority. They challenged socio-political demands for complicity, acquiescence, and silence. Although the field of biblical studies advanced due to its accommodation to European colonialism,50 this accommodation also enabled historical Bible critics to challenge the church’s doctrinal reading of the Bible. By employing historical criticism, Bible scholars demonstrated that biblical texts are not divine but human words to be critically investigated as such. Consequently, biblical scholars brought the question about the Bible’s authorship to the center of biblical exegesis, and the quest for the Bible’s authorial meaning has occupied generations of exegetes ever since. The various answers given over several hundreds of years have successfully torn away the Bible from religious control, so much so that nowadays biblical scholarship is mostly identified with the quest for historical meaning. Even religious organizations, grounded in scriptural authority, accept this quest as their own. Other events that deeply impacted Old Testament scholarship have further contributed to the importance of the historicalantiquarian approach with its affiliated epistemological assumptions. Yet these developments are not usually remembered as having emerged from a stance of resistance to religious hegemony. Yet at the same time, this resistance was enabled by accepting and even by nurturing colonial superiority. Thus, as geopolitical structures changed, historical Bible readings have come to serve imperial powers in society. This dynamic is still at work. Nowadays most biblical scholarship does not support resistance to the “unseen powers” in neoliberal, technocratic, and market-driven societies that engage in perpetual war, military engagement, and socio-economic exploitation of the hoi polloi. Most importantly, as Schüssler Fiorenza has argued so persistently, biblical scholarship stands in an ambiguous tradition of fostering democracy and democratic processes.51 As biblical scholarship has been largely complicit with the ethos of empire, far too often biblical scholars leave unaddressed and unchallenged sociopolitical and economic exploitation, injustice, and oppression. Migration illustrates the field’s ongoing silence about injustice in the world. A feminist hermeneutics of migration, sociologically framed, uncovers these and many other power structures in biblical interpretation to contribute on the intellectual and exegetical levels to justice, peace, and the integrity of creation. In sum, a sociologically framed approach to a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration assumes that interpretations are always context specific and socially located. 49 Edward W. Said, Humanism and Democratic Criticism (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2004), 135. 50  See my article in German entitled “Von der Dekolonisation deutschsprachiger Bibelexegese träumen,” in Jerusalemer Theologisches Forum, ed. Ulrich Winkler (Münster: Aschendorff Verlag, forthcoming). 51  See, e.g., Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, Democratizing Biblical Studies: Toward an Emancipatory Educational Space (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009).

258   Susanne Scholz They are never mere descriptions of a long-gone past or mere, harmless, and innocent expressions of personal piety in a world in which at least one-fifth of humanity will be on the move by 2050. While the sociologically framed approach examines, compares and contrast, highlights, and evaluates readerly assumptions found in the biblical interpretation history, it also takes a stance. In the face of “this age of heightened transnational migration,”52 a feminist hermeneutics of migration is neither silent about nor complicit with the various expressions of cooptation, acquiescence, and complicity into the structures of neoliberal or even authoritarian oppression. Rather, it sheds light on the implications of biblical exegesis. It contributes to eliminating the pervasive acceptance of migratory injustice that migrants experience globally. The next section elaborates further on the methodological implications for developing a sociological framework that ought to be the basis for a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration.

Methodological Considerations for a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics on Migration What should be clear by now is that a feminist biblical hermeneutics on migration does not merely retell biblical migrant stories of women, whether they are Eve, Hagar, Sarah, Rebecca, Miriam, Ruth, or Esther. Rather, as millions of people migrate around the globe, hermeneutical and epistemological processes for reading the Bible must change. Said differently, the current context of mass migration and refugees ought to modify the framework, purpose, function, and agenda of biblical studies as a scholarly enterprise. The contemporary neoliberal era alters how the field ought to engage from within its social location.53 Context should also inform the pedagogical purpose and vision of teaching the Bible in institutions of higher education. A changed curriculum is important because the higher-education curriculum filters down to high school, middle school, and elementary school curricula. Teaching the Bible according to a nineteenth-century paradigm is pedagogically, ethically, and exegetically irresponsible when epistemological, hermeneutical, and methodological assumptions must adapt to the geopolitical, cultural, and religious demands of the twenty-first century. Faced with today’s migratory movements worldwide, the scholarly agenda must be transformed to foster intellectual, pedagogical, and real-world relevance of biblical studies as an academic endeavor.

52  Cruz, “It Cuts Both Ways: Religion and Filipina Domestic Workers in Hong Kong,” 5. 53  That biblical scholarship has always engaged its context becomes clear in the study by Stephen D. Moore and Yvonne Sherwood, The Invention of the Biblical Scholar: A Critical Manifesto (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2011).

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   259 How then should we read biblical texts? I propose to approach this central question on the theoretical level. We must clarify the methodology of biblical studies. The deliberations of Nicolas Bouriaud, a French curator, are pertinent in this regard, as he describes the characteristic features of our post-postmodern era in a little book entitled The Radicant.54 Bouriaud observes that we live in the time of the radicant. This term comes from botany and refers to plants “taking root on, or above, the ground; rooting from the stem, as the trumpet creeper and the ivy.”55 A radicant is “an organism that grows its roots and adds new ones as it advances.”56 The term “radicant” captures what is going on nowadays. Like radicant plants, people wander from place to place. Previously they lived somewhere else, but they put down their roots anew migrating from country to country. Like radicant plants, many people move from here to there growing roots along the way. Multiple belonging is thus a characteristic of the neoliberal era producing enormous movements of people. Bouriaud states: To be radicant means setting one’s roots in motion, staging them in heterogeneous contexts and formats, denying them the power to completely define one’s identity, translating ideas, transcoding images, transplanting behaviors, exchanging rather than imposing. What if twenty-first-century culture were invented with those works that set themselves the task of effacing their origin in favor of a multitude of simultaneous or successive enrootings? This process of obliteration is part of the condition of the wanderer. . . .57

A feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration takes seriously the position of the radicant, the wanderer, and the migrant who find themselves “living in more or less voluntary exile.”58 Refugees, professional nomads, and irregular workers are everywhere59 and “increasingly commonplace,” as are an “unprecedented circulation of goods and services” and “the formation of transnational political entities,”60 the latter also known as corporations. Ours is the era of the global mobilization of people, things, and transnational entities, not to mention the global web of data infrastructures. Besides proposing to conceptualize migration as a radicant, Bouriaud also considers “the question of identity [as] most pressing for immigrant communities in the most globalized countries.”61 He observes perceptively that wanderers from culture to culture and land to land suffer because they hold on to their roots, their pre-immigrant identities.62 That is why second and third generations find life in the new land so much easier than the migrating generation. The younger ones do not so vividly remember their native lands, their roots, the “mythologized ‘origin’ against an integrating and homogenizing ‘soil.’ ”63 They mix and match multiple identities, develop new roots, and adapt to 54  Nicolas Bouriaud, The Radicant (New York, NY: Lucas & Sternberg, 2009). 55 ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­See http://www.encyclo.co.uk/meaning-of-Radicant [accessed April 12, 2017]. 56 Bouriaud, The Radicant, 22. 57 Ibid. 58  Ibid., 21. 59  Khalid Koser, International Migration: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). 60 Bouriaud, The Radicant, 21. 61 Ibid. 62 Ibid. 63 Ibid.

260   Susanne Scholz the new soil more easily than their parents or grant-parents. What is needed on the theoretical level is not “set[ting] one fixed root against another,”64 as religious and non-religious fundamentalists do increasingly on a global level. Rather, what is needed is an appreciation of multiple locations, various influences, shifting preferences, not played out against each other but nurtured by “a multitude of simultaneous or successive enrootings.”65 In other words, moving, shifting, and multiple locations, influences, and preferences characterize our age, the era of altermodernity or post-postmodernity. In “radicantity” we “engage in productive dialogue with a variety of different contexts.”66 These conversations and life experiences do not seek exclusive origins, histories, or roots, because nowadays people develop portable identities that “become more important than their local reality.”67 The methodological position of the radicant creates fragmentary, shifting, transitory, and dynamic sensibilities that unbind from essentialist notions of monolithic origins and pre-determined endpoints. It also puts the focus on the subject doing the reading, and it fosters inextricable links between biblical meanings and the Bible’s readers. Thus understood, radicant biblical exegesis turns into a significant practice against any kind of fundamentalist and right-wing agenda because it rejects essentializing as well as ontologically structured and monolithically defined exegesis. This kind of biblical interpretation also contributes to an ethics of resistance that nurtures opposition to the globalizing forces of capitalist consumption and economic standardization. It takes seriously the pluralistic experiences and aspirations of Bible-reading communities, helping those Bible readers to gain strength in spite of neoliberal, technocractic, and marketdriven power arrangements in the world. In sum, the position of the radicant ought to be the methodological stance with which to read the Bible and to study biblical interpretation histories. Its goal is to understand why and how we got to where we are today and how to move beyond the increasingly inhumane, ecologically devastating, and spiritually numbing status quo worldwide.

Studying the Bible as a Literary Tapestry of Gendered Migration Stories: Concluding Remarks I want to end on a personal note about the development of a feminist biblical hermeneutics of migration. I grew up with the stories of my grandmother who was a refugee (“Flüchtling”) with three little children—my two uncles and my mother—in 1944 to 1945. As a child, I believed the entire life of my grandmother had been the life of a refugee or, as we say in today’s clinical language, an “internally displaced person.”68 It was predictable when my 64 Ibid. 65  Ibid., 22. 66  Ibid., 106. 67  Ibid., 32. 68  See, e.g., Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, and Nando Sigona, “Introduction: Refugee and Forced Migration Studies in Transition,” in The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced

On the Development of a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics   261 granny would get into the mood of telling her refugee stories, right after the big Sunday lunch meal and before taking her afternoon nap. Her stories followed an inherent order, but she always welcomed questions. I was perhaps 16 years old when I realized that her refugee journey lasted about six months, and prior to her enormous ordeal fleeing from Silesia to Bavaria, she had enjoyed a “normal” youth before the war. On her journey she was almost killed in one of the refugee camps. Her stories were intense, frightening, and not for the faint-hearted listener. Her stories of being “auf der Flucht” (on her escape journey) and a “Flüchtling” (refugee) with three small children (one was a 3-year-old toddler) have become deeply engraved sensibilities even within me who grew up as part of the third generation of post-Holocaust Germans. Feelings of uncertainty, fear, and trauma never completely disappear for the adults who lived through them. Even the third generation knows of them on the gut level. I am thus convinced that the development of a feminist hermeneutics of migration is crucial. The current and worldwide rise of religious and non-religious fundamentalism and political authoritarianism needs to be understood as part of the other side of the coin of migration. In this age of migration, everybody will benefit from accepting and cherishing what so many people find so difficult: ambiguity, flexibility, elasticity, fluidity, malleability, mutability, and opaqueness. In short, we must learn to read like radicants, wherever we are, because so many people in the past and present live like them. A note of caution: This kind of learning cannot take place when people have not yet survived their migratory ordeals. Perhaps it can take place only afterwards, when people know where they will sleep and where their children will attend school. We have to be patient because the alternative is unacceptable and far too destructive. The singular, exclusionary, and monolithic fixation on One Truth, One (biblical) Meaning, and One Way of living does not open up a viable future for biblical exegesis or any other human activity. Past and present authoritarian regimes illustrate the incredible damage that this kind of repressive insistence does to humanity and planet earth. Biblical scholars have much to contribute to the ongoing learning processes toward the acceptance of the “Other,” the migrant. We can develop an exegetical framework beyond asserted singular (biblical) meanings either placed into the distant past or articulated in individualized, romanticized, and privatized piety. As all of humanity originates from migration and as the Bible itself is one “literary tapestry woven from the stories of migrants,”69 feminist biblical exegetes need to affirm theoretically the centrality of migration in biblical studies, or as Jorge E. Castillo Guerra explains in his quest for a theology of migration: we need to “use migration as a criterion for [exegetical] self-understanding (identity), methodological options, and epistemology.”70 The development of a feminist Migration Studies, ed. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, and Nando Sigona (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 1–19. 69  Leslie J. Hoppe, “Israel and Egypt: Relationships and Memory,” The Bible Today 45 (July–August 2007): 209. 70  Jorge E. Castillo Guerra, “From the Faith and Life of a Migrant to a Theology of Migration and Intercultural Convivencia,” in Migration as a Sign of the Times: Toward a Theology of Migration, ed. Judith Gruber and Sigrid Rettenbacher (Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill/Rodopi, 2015), 125.

262   Susanne Scholz biblical hermeneutics of migration goes far beyond a rehearsal of biblical women’s migrating stories. At its best it transforms the hermeneutical and methodological parameters of biblical exegesis beyond a text-fetishized approach that excludes the world from its purview.

Bibliography Agosta, Efraín, and Jacqueline M. Hidalgo, eds. Latinxs, the Bible, and Migration. The Bible and Cultural Studies. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. Carroll, M. Daniel R. Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible. Second ed. Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2013. Cragg, HyeRan Kim, and EunYoung Choi, eds. The Encounters: Retelling the Bible from Migration and Intercultural Perspectives. Daejeon, South Korea: Daejanggan, 2013. Cruz, Gemma Tulud. An Intercultural Theology of Migration: Pilgrims in the Wilderness. Leiden / Boston, MA: Brill, 2010. Cuéllar, Gregory Lee. Voices of Marginality: Exile and Return in Second Isaiah 40–55 and the Mexican Immigrant Experience. New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2008. De La Torre, Miguel A. Trails of Hope and Terror: Testimonies on Immigration. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2009. Groody, Daniel  G., and Gioacchino Campese, eds. A Promised Land, A Perilious Journey: Theological Perspectives on Migration. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2008. Ruiz, Jean-Pierre. Reading from the Edges: The Bible & People on the Move. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2011. Yee, Gale. “‘She Stood in Tears Amid the Alien Corn’: Ruth, the Perpetual Foreigner and Model Minority,” in They Were All Together in One Place? Toward Minority Biblical Criticism, ed. Randall C. Bailey, Tat-Siong Benny Liew, and Fernando F. Segovia, 119–40. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009.

Pa rt I I I

T H E I M PAC T OF (DIGI TA L) M E DI A C U LT U R E S ON F E M I N IST BI BL IC A L E X E GE SIS

chapter 17

The Bible , Wom en, a n d V ideo Ga m e s Linda S. Schearing

In the last decade, much has been written about the intersection between religion and video games.1 Rachel Wagner, for example, suggests that there are at least four “lenses” through which one can examine this connection: religion in gaming (religious practices that show up in games), religion as gaming (emphasis on similarities between religion and gaming), gaming as religion (emphasis on fandom and community), and gaming in religion (religiously informed games).2 But what about video games and the Bible? How can one explore this connection, especially as it concerns gender issues affecting women? Video games are a rather complex genre. One way of categorizing them focuses on the role of the gamer. There are simulation games, although technically one could argue that all video games fall into this category. There are also strategy games, action games, and role-playing games.3 While many of these games have distinct features, it is possible for a game to combine several. For instance, some games fall under multiple categories: as both an action game (e.g. first-person shooter) and a role-playing game. Another way to categorize video games is to be attentive to genre, platform (the hardware system), mode (e.g. movement and decisions, avatar creation, single-player versus multi-player), and milieu (visual game classification).4 The Bioshock video game series is a good example of a set of games that span two genres—action and role playing. The original game Bioshock came out in 2007 and was 1  A special “thanks” to my gamer daughter, Brittany, and son, Sean, who introduced me to Bioshock and who contributed their thoughts to this essay. 2  Heidi A. Campbell, Rachel Wagner, Shanny Luft, Rabia Gregory, Gregory Price Grieve, and Xenia Zeiler, “Gaming Religionworlds: Why Religious Studies Should Pay Attention to Religion in Gaming,” JAAR 84.3 (2015): 641–64. 3  Thomas H. Apperley, “Genre and Game Studies. Towards a Critical Approach to Video Game Genres,” Simulation and Gaming 37.1 (2006): 6–23. 4  Hemminger Elke, “Game Cultures as Sub Creations. Case Studies on Religion & Digital Play,” Online: Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet 5 (2014): 110–13; available at https://heiup. uni-heidelberg.de/journals/index.php/religions/issue/view/1449/showToc [accessed July 12, 2017].

266   Linda S. Schearing designed by Ken Levine.5 This game spawned two more sequels: Bioshock 2 in 2010 and Bioshock Infinite in 2013.6 This essay concentrates on the original game in the series. Not only did Bioshock win multiple awards, including the 2007 Game Critics Game of the Year, but it was also critically acclaimed by a host of other reviewers. The Boston Globe describes it as “a beautiful, brutal, and disquieting computer game . . . one of the best in years.”7 The Los Angeles Times review states: “Sure, it’s fun to play, looks spectacular and is easy to control. But it also does something no other game has done to date: It really makes you feel.”8 The New York Times reviewer describes it as “intelligent, gorgeous, occasionally frightening” and added “BioShock can . . . hold its head high among the best games ever made.”9 Bioshock’s artistic dimension was of such quality that the Smithsonian selected Bioshock for inclusion in its “The Art of Video Games” exhibit in 2012.10 While Bioshock (2007) originally came out on the Microsoft Xbox 360 platform, the game was later released on other platforms as well, such as Sony PlayStation 3. So why did Bioshock get such acclaim and widespread use, and what is its relationship to the Bible and women? In analyzing video games one has to realize that games have several “layers.” First there is the game story, a game’s “narrative.” An analysis of this level of the game might well employ aspects of a literary analysis, but game stories are different from those on the page. If games have “narratives,” they are presented in a visual/audio/technical mode. The same media and music analysis one uses on films can be useful. Indeed, game scholars have often discussed the merits of narratological versus ludological approaches to game studies.11 But once again, video games are more than visual/audio enhanced stories or digital masterpieces: they are an interactive experience.12 As one analyst remarks: “Games are both object and process; they can’t be read as texts, or listened to as music, they must be played.”13 The gamer interacts with the game in ways that both challenge the story and present the gamer with choices, sometimes even moral choices. 5  BioShock, Developer: 2K Boston, Publisher: 2K Games, 2007. 6  BioShock 2, Developer: 2K Marin, Publisher: 2K Games, 2010; Bioshock Infinite, Developer: Irrational Games, Publisher: 2K Games, 2013. 7  “Reception: Critical Response,” Keen Gamer; available at http://www.keengamer.com/Game/ bioshock/detail [accessed July 12, 2017]. 8  Pete Metzger, “Bioshock? You’re Soaking in It,” Los Angeles Times (September 20, 2007); available at http://articles.latimes.com/2007/sep/20/news/wk-gamea20 [accessed July 12, 2017]. 9  Seth Schiesel, “Genetics Gone Haywire and Predatory Children in an Undersea Metropolis,” New York Times (September 8, 2007): http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/08/arts/television/08shoc.html [accessed July 12, 2017]. 10 “Original BioShock Video Game Included in Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Upcoming ‘The Art of Video Games’ Exhibit,” BusinessWire (May 20, 2011); available at http://www.businesswire .com/news/home/20110520005136/en/Original-BioShock%C2%AE-Video-Game-IncludedSmithsonian-American [accessed July 12, 2017]. 11  Ryan Lizardi, “Bioshock: Complex, and Alternate Histories,” Game Studies: The International Journal of Computer Game Research 14.1 (2014); available at http://gamestudies.org/1401/articles/ lizardi [accessed July 12, 2017]. 12  Grant Tavinor, “Bioshock and the Art of Rapture,” Philosophy and Literature 33 (2009): 92–3. 13  Espen Aarseth, as cited in Gerard Kraus, “Video Games: Platforms, Programmes and Players,” in Glen Creeber and Martin Royston (eds.), Digital Culture: Understanding New Media (Maidenhead: Open University Press, 2009): 84.

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   267 In addition to the analytical complexities, it is not unusual for video game writers to use cultural and intertextual references in their games, thus opening the game to the possibility for an intertextual analysis. It is no secret that the developers of Bioshock crafted their storyline on the basis of Ayn Rand’s novel, Atlas Shrugged (1959). Indeed, the name of one of the characters in the story, Andrew Ryan, is an artful pun on the name Ayn Rand. Many scholars suggest that the game is a critique of her objectivist philosophy.14 Often video game worlds also give concrete expression to powerful mythic themes. An intertextual analysis of Bioshock’s themes reveals that many of them refer to or resonate with the Bible, especially Genesis 2–3.

The Bible and Bioshock: The Game Story If Bioshock were a book, it would be classified as Science Fiction in the form of a dystopian alternative history. Its core story involves the underwater city of Rapture. Rapture was built by a wealthy businessman, Andrew Ryan, in 1946, and was designed as a capitalist utopia where the elite could go to get away from the despair of the post–World War II world. At the beginning of the game a film projector displays a series of slides onto a screen and the voice of Andrew Ryan proclaims: I am Andrew Ryan and I am here to ask you a question: Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? “No,” says the man in Washington, “it belongs to the poor.” “No,” says the man in the Vatican, “it belongs to God.” “No,” says the man in Moscow, “It belongs to everyone.” I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose . . . Rapture.15

Thus, according to Ryan, Rapture “was a city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality. Where the great would not be constrained by the small!”16 For Ryan, rational self-interest is the central value whereas the root of all wickedness is altruism. Although Rapture was built in 1946, the gamer does not enter it until fourteen years later, in 1960. The game begins with a plane crash in the Atlantic but you, the gamer, are able to make your way to a small island with a lighthouse. The lighthouse has a portal that allows you to enter a bathysphere and make your way down to the underwater city of Rapture. Notice I said that “you” are able to make your way down because, unlike the fictive world of novels and films, video games are interactive fiction. You (the gamer) affect the storyline. As interactive fiction, Bioshock falls in the first-person shooter/role-playing 14  Joseph Packer, “The Battle for Galt’s Gulch: Bioshock as Critique of Objectivism,” Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds 2.3 (2009): 209–24. 15  Andrew Ryan, Bioshock (2007). 16 Ibid.

268   Linda S. Schearing categories. Why do you have to shoot things? As you enter Rapture it is very clear that something has gone terribly wrong. What was intended to be utopia has turned into a leaking, nightmarish dystopia. As you enter the city, the ruins of shops flank your path. Debris is everywhere. Not only do you have to fight the encroaching waters of the Atlantic Ocean as you make your way through leaking corridors, but you also have to fight Rapture’s crazed inhabitants. What happened to Andrew Ryan’s dream? Your ultimate goal as a player/character is to get out of Rapture, but to succeed you have to discover something about Bioshock’s game world. As you go into Rapture, you encounter various posters and blood-stained graffiti as well as voice recorders left by the city’s former inhabitants. These items, along with scripted sequences from a few other characters, gradually unfold the city’s history. Ryan Industries discovered and marketed something called “plasmids.” Plasmids allow a person to evolve by genetically enhancing their DNA. Through this bio-augmentation you can acquire cosmetic changes as well as powers such as telekinesis or the ability to shoot fire, ice, or electricity from your fingertips. All of this is made possible through genetic manipulation. What temptation! Who wouldn’t want to become more than what they are? The result, predictably, was catastrophic. Not only did the plasmids grant powers but they resulted in addiction, physical deformity, and mental instability. That which people thought would give them god-like powers turned them instead into monsters the game refers to as “splicers.” They are violent characters who are physically and mentally scarred. You have to kill them before they kill you. What does any of this have to do with the Bible, especially Genesis 2–3? For a utopia that was supposed to be free of religious influence there are numerous religious symbols in the game’s background. Aside from the city’s name (“Rapture”) and background religious music (“Jesus Loves Me”), there are smugglers. When the gamer enters Smugglers Hangout, for instance, the gamer encounters a crucified smuggler with a scattering of Bibles and crucifixes on the floor. In Bioshock, an active underground market for Bibles and other religious materials exist that smugglers bring into Rapture from the outside world. While some of these examples and references might be considered rather gratuitous hollow intertexts, other features of the game clearly evoke a story much older than Atlas Shrugged. Utopias turned into dystopias are a frequent theme in video games. It is thus unsurprising that Genesis 2–3 becomes a useful intertext in the game. In one of the recordings left by a worker involved in the construction of Rapture, the worker discloses that he warned Ryan: If things weren’t bad enough, it seems that even our water system’s sprung a leak. Yep, that’s right. The irrigation system in Arcadia is taking on sea water. I told Mr. Ryan when we were building this place; either you build her like a bathtub, or she’s gonna turn into a sewer. “No, McDonagh,” he said, “we’re not gonna build no bathtub . . . we’re gonna build Eden.”17

17  McDonagh, “Neptune’s Bounty Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007).

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   269 Ryan sees in his underwater city a symbolic echo of the iconic perfection of Genesis 2. Yet just as the first humans did not linger long in Eden, so Rapture falls soon into a dystopian nightmare. Unlike Adam and Eve who leave “paradise” at the end of Genesis 3, Rapture’s inhabitants have to live in the crumbling leaking remains of their ruined utopia. This allusion to Genesis 2–3 is not the only meaningful intertextuality in the game. There are also the substances ADAM and EVE. The plasmids that are the key to genetic manipulation in Rapture require these two substances to activate them. You cannot get a plasmid without a substance called ADAM. Is ADAM powerful? The audio diary of Dr. Julia Langford declares that: “ADAM, ADAM, ADAM. . . . It’s bathtub gin, times the atom bomb, times Eve with the serpent.”18 But ADAM is useless without another substance to fuel it: EVE. While you can get EVE in different ways, you have to inject it with a hypodermic needle (with an outline of an apple) so you can use the ADAM you have acquired. Thus far in Bioshock’s game story, you have Ryan who fancies himself as a creator of his own “paradise” and even likens his goal to building Eden. You have this paradise’s inhabitants who succumb to the temptation to be more than what they are. They evolve, getting superhuman, god-like powers. And it is ADAM and EVE that makes this “evolution” possible. But where does that leave you, the player? After all, these references are so much ancient history. Similar to Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 who choose to eat what was forbidden, the inhabitants of Rapture choose to use ADAM and EVE. Arriving in Rapture after all of these events have transpired, you, the gamer, have a choice too, albeit not the same as the inhabitants of Rapture. You need the powers granted by the plasmids, not because you strive for the perfection of evolution, but because you will need their power to survive if you ever hope to get out of Rapture. Your choice however, revolves around how you are going to get your ADAM. It is Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum who first discovers that a sea slug has certain rejuvenative properties. Tenenbaum is a Jewish holocaust survivor who as a child was in a concentration camp where her brilliance was recognized by the German scientists. As such, she represents a morally ambiguous geneticist who worked for Nazi Germany and later discovered ADAM. She develops ADAM and devises how to ensure a steady supply. She genetically alters the bodies of little orphaned girls of 5–8 years so that their bodies become reprocessing facilities of the used ADAM they collect from the splicer corpses that litter Rapture. The girls are called “Little Sisters.” The girls are protected by “Big Daddies” whom the player has to eliminate to reach the girls. Yet the death of the Big Daddies are not really the source of your moral quandary. Your dilemma involves the Little Sisters themselves. You can harvest all the ADAM they contain, but you will have to kill them. Alternatively, you can heal them, restore their humanity and turn them into smiling little girls who will thank you. Yet if you choose the latter option, you will get a much smaller amount of ADAM. Are you going to choose the path that gives you the maximum benefit? Or will you choose the path of the minimum? One of the narrative voices that guides you through the game tries to influence your decision: 18  Julia Langford, “Arcadia Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007).

270   Linda S. Schearing You think that’s a child down there? Don’t be fooled. She’s a Little Sister now. Somebody went and turned a sweet baby girl into a monster. Whatever you thought about right and wrong on the surface, well that don’t count for much down in Rapture. Those Little Sisters, they carry ADAM; the genetic material that keeps the wheel of Rapture turning. Everybody wants it. Everybody needs it.19

All gamers have to make choices when they play video games. But frequently, these are operational choices about what route to take or what weapon to use. More often than not, gamers are confronted with characters like zombies, monsters, or aliens that might be considered negligible from a moral standpoint; they are game-play fodder. Bioshock’s Splicer characters are a good example of this.20 The choice presented by the Little Sisters, however, are different, not as an operational choice but a moral one. When gamers enter the fictional world of video games they do so in the guise of a character called an avatar. Accordingly, they do not only have to discover the game’s narrative, but they also must discover their own nature.21 In this way, video games are different from other types of gaming. Scott Paeth, a Christian ethicist who is also a gamer, observes: The sense of identification between player and character is where moral possibilities—and the risks—of gaming lie. . . . As Christian ethicist, I enter the moral worlds of video games with some resources for reflection. Part of my distaste with playing evil comes from my sense that acting callously in the fictional setting of the game world might transfer over to my real world persona.22

For Bioshock, the issue of the moral agency is often seen as central. In 2009, the University of Washington offered a course on Bioshock as part of their Critical Gaming Project. The course was entitled “CHID 496F Bioshock: Cyborg Morality & Posthuman Choice.” The course description states: “Bioshock affords . . . an excellent opportunity to investigate . . . moral, political, and cultural issues.”23 The course focused on body modification and posthumanism, But, in my view, the moral issue presented by the Little Sisters is still different. In Genesis 2, God confronts the first human with one prohibition, not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. The presence of this prohibition guarantees that Adam and Eve have a choice; they can either obey or disobey. The presence of this choice establishes free will or moral agency. As a gamer, you too have free will (or the illusion of free will) in regard to the Little Sisters. You can kill them or you can save them. It is only a game and the Little Sisters are not real. In an earlier version of the game, Bioshock’s developers created 19  Atlas, “Radio Message,” in Bioshock (2007). 20  Tavinor, “Bioshock and the Art of Rapture,” 99. 21  Ibid., 94. 22  Scott R. Paeth, “The Moral Complexity of Video Games: Virtual Good and Evil,” Christian Century (March 21, 2012): 24. 23  “CHID 496F Bioshock: Cyborg Morality and Posthuman Choice,” CPG: Critical Gaming Project; available at https://depts.washington.edu/critgame/wordpress/courses/bioshock-cyborg-morality-andposthuman-choice/ [accessed July 12, 2017].

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   271 the Little Sister character as a bug. But they changed this image because they thought gamers could not relate to a bug. They did not think gamers could really feel anything for an insect, and they wanted gamers to feel something.24 How did gamers respond to the moral choice presented by the little girls? A recent study that investigated how players handle moral concerns in violent video games discovered that the desire for winning enables players to temporarily place their morals on hold.25 Yet not all of those playing Bioshock, are able to do so. For instance, Grant Tavinor, a lecturer in philosophy at Lincoln University reports: When confronted by the choice, I couldn’t bring myself to harvest the Little Sister; in fact, the prospect of doing so made me feel queasy. And so, I saved her an action that was accompanied by a sudden swelling of the accompanying music and my own emotions. This response is not peculiar to me—I’m not an overly sensitive gamer— as almost everyone I have spoken to about the game has acknowledged a similar emotional reaction.26

Similarly, in an interview, Bioshock’s own Ken Levine responded to a question if he “harvested” the Little Sisters by stating: Honestly, I—can’t. [Laughs]. . . . I had a journalist talk to me yesterday who said his fiancé saw him harvest a Little Sister and now he’s sleeping on the couch. . . . I know there are people who do, but they have to live with that choice.27

As one of Bioshock’s characters, Andrew Ryan, notes: “We all make choices, but in the end, our choices make us.”28 Ryan’s words are an important reminder that when gamers play video games such as Bioshock, there may be consequences beyond entertainment.

Gender, Women, and Bioshock Bioshock has a number of issues related to gender best analyzed in the following four questions. First, what is the relationship betwee the gender of the player and the gender of the character they represent in the game world? Second, how are female characters 24  Kieron Gillen, “Exclusive: Ken Levine on the Making of Bioshock,” RockPaperShotgun (August 20, 2007); available at https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2007/08/20/exclusive-ken-levine-on-themaking-of-bioshock/ [accessed July 12, 2017]. 25  Richard E. Ferdig, “Developing a Framework for Understanding the Relationship between Religion and Videogames,” Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet (online journal) 5 (2014): 76. 26  Tavinor, “Bioshock and the Art of Rapture,” 98. 27  Alexander Sliwinski, “Joystiq Interviews Bioshock’s Ken Levine about success and harvesting Little Sisters,” engaget (August 24, 2007); available at https://www.engadget.com/2007/08/24/joystiqinterviews-bioshocks-ken-levine-about-success-and-harve/ [accessed July 12, 2017]. 28  “Andrew Ryan,” in Bioshock (2007).

272   Linda S. Schearing visualized? Third, what types of female characters inhabit the game world? Fourth, how does the substance EVE relate to its biblical counterpart Eve?

On the Relationship of Avatars and Gender Gamers enter the video game world through an avatar or character. The more closely players identify with their avatars in virtual reality, the more likely arises the possibility of real world consequences. While this identification is frequently discussed concerning first-person shooter games and the violence they involve, avatars also create gender conflicts. Although some games allow the gamer to choose the gender of the avatar, many avatars are male. One might deduce that this gender bias is intended to coincide with the gender of the gamer because most gamers are assumed to be male.29 In the 1980s and early 1990s, this assumption was perhaps correct, but female gamers are no longer a minority. When games have female avatars, their bodies are often visualized in an over-sexualized manner. This oversexualization coincides with the depiction of female video-game characters in general.30 Since video games are interactive fiction, the inclusion or exclusion of female avatars makes a difference for women gamers. For instance, Jesse Fox and others warn of the possible consequences of women and girls encountering and accepting sexualized female avatars as their game representatives. They explain: Going forward, it is clear that further research is needed to determine the short- and long-term effects of sexualized representations as well as what may mitigate negative effects. With video games and online virtual environments becoming an increasingly popular pastime, and women continuing to be portrayed as interactive sex objects within them, we need a greater understanding of these experiences before we subject women and girls to objectifying and detrimental imagery in another, and possibly more powerful, medium. Our studies take an important step in this direction by demonstrating that women who spend time in virtual environments and playing video games featuring sexualized characters may subsequently self-objectify, and that this self-objectification may in turn lead to generalized negative attitudes toward women in the form of endorsing rape myths. As we continue to seek explanations for the perpetuation of RMA and rape culture in society, it is important that we examine the messages transmitted through various media.31

29  Benjamin Paaßen, Thekla Morgenroth, and Michelle Stratemeyer, “What Is a True Gamer? The Male Gamer Stereotype and the Marginalization of Women in Video Game Culture,” Sex Roles 76.7/8 (April 2017): 421–35. 30  Jesse Fox, Rachel A. Ralston, Cody K. Cooper, and Kaitlyn A. Jones, “Sexualized Avatars Lead to Women’s Self-Objectification and Acceptance of Rape Myths,” Psychology of Women Quarterly 39.3 (2015): 349–62. 31  Ibid., 358–9.

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   273 Importantly, few studies investigate the long-term impact of sexualized representations for female gamers. Fox and her co-authors consider such game depictions as part of rape culture, a strong statement indeed. Yet there are also some indications that sexualized presentations of female avatars have begun to change. Media researcher Teresa Lynch collected data on 571 playable female characters in various video games from 1989 to 2014. She observes that a change has occurred in the last ten years, stating: “We at­trib­ute this decline to an increasing female interest in gaming coupled with the heightened criticism levied at the industry’s male hegemony.”32 An interesting example is the female avatar/protagonist Lara Croft in Tomb Raider whose image changes from a busty, scantily clad, sexualized character to a more normal body type in pants and a tank top. Lynch, however, emphasizes that oversexualized depictions persist among most secondary female characters.33 Yet in Bioshock, gamers cannot choose a female avatar, and so female gamers who play Bioshock must use a male avatar named Jack. You never “see” how Jack looks. Only during the game do gamers begin to realize Jack’s real identity and his importance to the other characters. In short, this male avatar’s physical appearance (unlike many female avatars’ bodies in other video games) never seems to be important. The same cannot be said of the non-avatar female characters in Bioshock.

On the Visualization of Female Characters and the Beauty Ideal Throughout history, societal expectations of female beauty have plagued women’s selfesteem. One interesting aspect of the decadence of Rapture in Bioshock pertains to the issue of physical attributes, especially those of women. For instance, graffiti on the floor of the Medical Pavilion reads: “Aesthetics are a moral imperative.”34 Other visual artifacts offer similar messages. A poster features a beautiful woman with the reminder: “Remember you can never be too perfect.” Another poster proudly promises: “With ADAM there is no reason not to be beautiful.” This statement is rather ironic because increased use of ADAM leads to physical deformities. However, the use of ADAM is not the only problem when it comes to beauty; there is also Dr. J. S. Steinman. While a popular adage states that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” the idea takes on a new dimension in Bioshock. Dr. Steinman’s office is located in the game’s second level, called the “Medical Pavilion.” He is a plastic surgeon involved in “cosmetic enhancement,” as advertised on the posters. Yet he is more than a surgeon, as he also considers himself an artist:

32  Lynch, Teresa, Jessica E. Tompkins, Irene I. van Driel, and Niki Fritz, “Sexy, Strong, and Secondary: A Content Analysis of Female Characters in Video Games across 31 Years,” Journal of Communication (2016): 13. 33  Ibid., 13–14. 34  “Medical Pavilion,” in Bioshock (2007).

274   Linda S. Schearing ADAM presents new problems for the professional. As your tools improve, so do your standards. There was a time, I was happy enough to take off a wart or two, or turn a real circus freak into something you can show in the daylight. But that was then, when we took what we got, but with ADAM . . . the flesh becomes clay. What excuse do we have not to sculpt, and sculpt, and sculpt, until the job is done?35

As Steinman becomes more and more crazed in his ADAM usage, his view on “beauty” changes. He likens himself to a contemporary Picasso: When Picasso became bored of painting people, he started representing them as cubes and other abstract forms. The world called him a genius! I’ve spent my entire surgical career creating the same tired shapes, over and over again: the upturned nose, the cleft chin, the ample bosom. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I could do with a knife what that old Spaniard did with a brush?36

The manifestation of his quest for female perfection can be found in the results of his “artistry.” Proof of his “artwork” appears on the disfigured posters hanging on the walls of Rapture and the disfigured bodies scattered on the floors. Horribly mutilated faces and bodies reflect Steinman’s quest to produce the perfection of beauty. Especially significant is the fact that it is only visages of women that appear on the posters, and we hear only from women who were operated on by Steinman as he practiced his “art.” Thus once again, the game emphasizes cultural expectations of female physical appearance.

On the Female Characters in the Game World While the powerful figures in Bioshock are males, two types of female characters symbolize most prominently the assumptions of gender in Bioshock. The first are the female scientists. Bioshock’s depiction of female scientists such as Dr. Julie Langford and Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum is important for two reasons. In contrast to the oversexualized female avatars and secondary characters that often populate video games, Langford and Tenenbaum are noted for their intellect. This thirst for knowledge and work as scientists is certainly unusual for female characters of the games in the 1940s and 1950s. Yet this commendable shift from a highly sexualized portrayal of women to women as scholars also has a downside. When these female scholars search for knowledge, their actions have disastrous consequences. The negative depiction is particularly virulent for the character of the geneticist, Brigid Tenenbaum. For instance, she explains in one of the audio diaries: I saw one of the smugglers having a game of catching on the docks today. And this surprised me, because his hands were crippled during the war. He was unloading 35  J. S. Steinman, “Medical Pavilion Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007). 36 Ibid.

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   275 the barge the other day when he was bitten from this sea slug. He woke up the next morning and he found he could move his fingers for the first time in years. I asked him if he still had that sea slug. As luck would have it, he did.37

Another example appears later in the game. There, gamers realize that Tenenbaum is instrumental in the discovery of ADAM. Moreover, she helps develop the ADAM “factories” that become the “Little Sisters.” Tenenbaum explains in an audio diary: The children must remain functional be to effective producers of ADAM. I had hoped we could place them into vegetative state so they would be more pliable. I find being around them very uncomfortable. Even with those things implanted in their bellies, they are still children. They play and sing. Sometimes they look at me, and they don’t stop. Sometimes they smile.38

Yet eventually, Tenenbaum shows remorse over the “ADAM factories” that she helps create. She explains: One of the children came and sat in my lap. I push her off, I shout, “Get away from me!” I can see the Adam oozing out of the corner of her mouth, thick and green. Her filthy hair hanging in her face, dirty clothes, and that dead glow in her eye. . . . I feel . . . hatred, like I never felt before, in my chest. Bitter, burning, fury. I can barely breathe. And suddenly, I know, it is not this child I hate.39

Ultimately the little girls awaken Tenenbaum’s maternal feelings, and so she views the girls as her daughters. She even tries everything to free them and make them “normal” again. In a way, her eventual concern for the “Little Sisters” becomes a step towards her becoming a more moral character in the game. Tenenbaum’s characterization has evoked comments on multiple blogging sites. Some bloggers see her dedication to knowledge as a pro-feminist image while others focus on the disastrous results that come as a consequence of her “seeking knowledge.” Those who hold this latter position regard her shift to “maternal” feelings as an antifeminist glorification of women’s traditional role as mother. Yet, neither position is correct because for contemporary feminists the role of a professional woman and the role of a mother are not an “either/or” proposition. One reviewer notes that female characters such as Tenenbaum integrate emotion and reason and thus are the only sane characters in the game.40 The second type of female characters are the “Little Sisters.” They are intriguing because gamers encounter them as infantile and vulnerable as well as requiring the protection given by the “Big Daddies.” Thus, they are often seen to reinforce patriarchal 37  Brigid Tenenbaum, “Neptune’s Bounty Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007). 38  Brigid Tenenbaum, “Farmer’s Market Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007). 39 Ibid. 40  Michael Clarkson, “Critical Composition: Bioshock,” Critical Distance (June 17, 2009); available at http://www.critical-distance.com/2009/06/17/bioshock/ [accessed July 12, 2017].

276   Linda S. Schearing values as they are small, weak, and naïve. They call the Big Daddies “Mr. Bubbles,” and they call “angels” the corpses from which they collect the ADAM. The Little Sisters are the proverbial damsels in distress who need to be rescued by the big, powerful, and paternal males. Near the end of the game, Tenenbaum reflects: “I know why it has to be children, but why just girls? This I cannot determine why, but I know it is so.”41 But the Little Sisters are also central to getting what gives people power in the game, namely ADAM. Does their central role give them a positive characterization or does it merely reinforce their image as “helpless human commodities”?42 It remains unclear throughout the game. Still, the Little Sisters are significant for another reason. Game reviewers describe them as “the moral center of Bioshock.”43 First-time players, who have not read any spoilers, understand only at the end of the game that there are several possible endings. They are determined by the gamer’s actions toward the Little Sisters. If a gamer chooses to harvest the Little Sisters so that the gamer gets the maximum amount of ADAM, the sickness that a gamer sees in Rapture destroys the world outside Rapture. If the gamer saves a few of the Little Sisters, the result is a little bit better. However, if the gamer refuses to harvest any of the Little Sisters and instead helps them, the game ends differently. The gamer and the Little Sisters escape, the outside world is saved, and the Little Sisters tell the gamer that they love the gamer and that they are all “family.” When players receive this ending, some report to have tears in their eyes!

On the Substance, EVE, and the Biblical Eve In Bioshock the story features an Eden-like city turned dystopia. There is temptation. There is choice. There is a substance ADAM. But what about the substance EVE? Unlike the biblical account of Adam and Eve, the gamer encounters EVE before they encounter ADAM. Moreover, the substance EVE is not derived from ADAM although it is absolutely essential to the game. For instance, in the reception history of Genesis 2–3, the biblical Eve is frequently linked to both sexuality and knowledge. This link is usually related to the various interpretations of the Hebrew verb, “to know,” referring to both physical and intellectual knowledge. Unsurprisingly, both of these notions about knowledge also appear in Eve’s characterization in Bioshock. The effort to link Eve with sexual knowledge is apparent in the sexualized objectification of Eve in the location named “Eve’s Garden XXX.” Located on the game’s seventh level, “Eve’s Garden XXX” is an erotic dancing venue found in Fort Frolic. An advertisement for the club in Bioshock features a half-naked Mermaid holding out a large, tantalizing fruit with an invitation emblazoned on its skin: “Come Bite the Apple!”44 Bioshock also objectifies Eve in nonsexual ways. A reference to the biblical garden of Eden is found in Bioshock’s “Gatherer’s Garden,” a vending machine foun­­­d on each of Bioshock’s 41  Brigid Tenenbaum, “Point Prometheus Audio Diaries,” in Bioshock (2007). 42  Clarkson, “Critical Composition: Bioshock.” 43  Tavinor, “Bioshock and the Art of Rapture,” 104. 44  Bioshock (2007).

The Bible, Women, and Video Games   277 levels. Gamers can purchase plasmids with red fluid­­­­­­­­­­­in an apple shaped container with the ADAM that they have acquired from the Little Sisters. The gamer buys EVE in vending machines and other venues. Bioshock’s female scientists, such as Tenenbaum, echo the biblical Eve, as their quest for knowledge has disastrous consequences. Although the substance EVE is instrumental in the genetic mutation that causes the downfall of Rapture, it is also central to leaving Rapture. Without EVE a gamer will not survive. In this way, Bioshock’s EVE is similar to its biblical counterpart. Yet the first biblical woman eats from the tree in the early part of Genesis 3 and receives her name only at the end of the chapter. She is Eve, “life,” and without her, there would be no offspring in Genesis 4. Moreover, the life she creates is only possible through the partnership with the first male. In Bioshock, ADAM and EVE are useless by themselves but they work with each other. Despite EVE’s importance, it is odd that the game focuses more on ADAM than on EVE. One blogger notes: I get why Adam is necessary, it rewrites your genetic code to let you use plasmids. And that’s neat. But I figure, once they get the Adam they need for the plasmid, why aren’t they obsessed with getting Eve so they can use their plasmids whenever they want? . . . I feel like if I was a splicer I’d be obsessed with Eve.45

Bible, Gender, and Gaming: A Conclusion When Ken Levine explains the influences behind his creation of Bioshock he usually mentions Ayn Rand but not Genesis 2–3. Nevertheless, the cultural power of an intertext is that it resonates with its past use and cannot be forgotten or erased.46 By employing the symbols of Eden, namely Adam and Eve, the game evokes the memory of the biblical story whose themes have been told and retold in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim writings throughout the centuries. As a story ubiquitous in Western popular culture, its symbols often function as cultural artifacts. As such, these symbols inform the social construction of gender in both positive and negative ways. Bioshock is a good example of such usage. On the one hand, the substance EVE is life and essential to the safety of the gamer. On the other hand, “Eve’s Garden XXX” is an exotic dancing venue that objectifies women as sexual objects. While cultural artifacts take inspiration from the biblical text, they owe no alliance to the religious meanings of such symbols and often recycle the story for their own use. 45  “Why are the Splicers Obsessed with Adam and Not Eve?” Bioshock; available at: https://www .reddit.com/r/Bioshock/comments/1yxcyf/why_are_the_splicers_obsessed_with_adam_and_not/. 46  Mark Cameron Love, “Not-So-Sacred Quests: Religion, Interextuality and Ethics in Video Games,” Religious Studies and Theology 29.2 (2010): 200.

278   Linda S. Schearing Yet Bioshock does more than allude to ancient themes. It is interactive fiction. When players enter Rapture/Eden they must make their own choices. These choices affect their gaming experience and, as some scholars suggest, affect and reflect their decision-making reasoning outside of gaming. This situation is particularly significant when it comes to gender stereotypes and perception. How will gamers react to the objectification of Bioshock’s secondary female characters? Will the sexualization of these characters reinforce gender prejudice? Or will the possibilities presented by the game’s female scientists, with their balance of reason and emotion, be inspiring? Will a gamer’s actions in the virtual world of Bioshock have any consequences for gendered relations in the real world in which the gamer lives? The answers to these questions are crucial because the words of the digital character Andrew Ryan are more important than gamers realize: “We all make choices, but in the end, our choices make us.” In the end, gamers are not as independent as they want to believe they are, unconsciously reinforcing ancient stereotypes over and over again. We also need to ask what choices about gender gaming corporations will make in the future. Will they have more avatar selections for gamers? Will they recognize that all gamers do not fit into the traditional stereotype of the “male” gamer? And what can women’s voices contribute to the development of the gaming genre? Although feminist biblical scholars are trained in analyzing the world within the text (narrative criticism), the world behind the text (historical reconstruction and the history of the text’s composition), and the world in front of the text (reception criticism), they are not always conversant with the role that popular culture plays in a text’s interpretation. Yet as cultural artifacts, biblical texts appear in numerous ways in popular culture with implications for and assumptions about gender. For this reason, feminist biblical scholars need to pay attention to this type of appropriation. Several years ago, a colleague and I examined the effects of popular culture’s appropriations on the imagination of what it means to be a man and a woman. We did not directly address video games, but one of our comments reminds feminist scholars that even video games bear witness to the influence of biblical texts and their longevity. We stated: “While encountering the Bible in popular culture may be ‘fun,’ it also carries implications for the construction of gender. Adam and Eve as the first man and woman in the story world of Eden still inspire us to call on them, whether for a joke or to sell a product. As long as that remains true, the path back to the Garden